


Come down and rot with us, baby; we guarantee you'll love it

by Baryshnikov



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 1930s, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Non-Magical, Betrayal, Blood, Cannibalism, Catholicism, Cliques, Corpse Desecration, Dark Academia, Dark Harry Potter, Feelings of Inadequacy, Flowers, Is this a social club or a cult?, Knights of Walpurgis, Law, Libraries, Manipulative Tom Riddle, Masochism, Mild Mutilation, Multi, Murder, Other Additional Tags May Be Added, Philosophy, Pining, Politics, Purebloods (Harry Potter), Sexual Content, Unhealthy Relationships, Unrequited Crush, Unrequited Love, Voyeurism, eventual Harry Potter/Tom Riddle, mild stalking, old money, power, rich people
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-09
Updated: 2019-10-24
Packaged: 2019-11-14 11:22:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 54,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18051572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Baryshnikov/pseuds/Baryshnikov
Summary: Everyone knew about Tom Riddle's little clique, only the brightest, wealthiest, most gorgeous people were ever included. So, the question was, howfarHarry go to get in?OrA 'Brideshead Revisited' meets 'The Riot Club' meets 'Stoker' meets 'Hannibal' meets 'The Secret History' fic.





	1. Prologue: sine qua non

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is just a kind of floatation of an idea that if people like it, I’ll continue. I apologise for it being so AU-ish, but you know, as awesome as magic is, I have an absolute nightmare of a time trying to write it, so I hope this isn’t too awful.
> 
> Another note, normally this sort of AU would take place at Oxbridge, but I have always had a great dislike for Oxbridge, so instead, I’m using the University of London as the basis, and completely messing with everything anyway. I’m also pushing it back a few years to fit a little better around World War two, so this is probably set in the mid-1930s.

As he was lying on his bed, staring at the blank white ceiling in the silence of after-midnight, Harry had to wonder how it had all come to this. How his shirt had come to be spotted with red, speckled with so many shades of someone else’s body. How he’d come to have blood on his hands, ingrained into his skin and stuck under his nails. How he’d come to have the taste of blood in his mouth, sliding over his tongue and staining his teeth. When his eyes were burning and that silent static was stretching his ears, he had to wonder how tearing someone apart could possibly have come to feel this _good_. 

** Nine months earlier **

From the moment he’d stepped inside the university lecture hall, Harry knew he was out of his depth. Sitting there, with the wood of the seat digging into his back, he was surrounded by pressed suits and smart shoes and sharp smiles. Mouths that bled words he didn’t understand, and casual hints of the private advantages they’d each had the privileged to receive. Sitting there, Harry was surrounded by people who were so different from himself, people who knew each other from their expensive boarding schools and country clubs, and their father’s who went to school together and still met for an annual Boxing day foxhunt. Harry knew he wasn’t like them. He didn’t have friends that he was predestined to meet based on who he was born to, nor did he have a family that could pay for his every whim – he didn’t have a family at all. He was here because he had earned it, here because he slaved away to finally be free of the people who didn’t really care about him, and never having to go back to them would be worth enduring all the expensive chatter in the world. That was what he told himself, told himself repeatedly.  
~  
It wasn’t more than a few days before he heard about them. Just _them_. A simple slice of a suggestion in the corridor, that he heard as he was passing by, a name that hung heavy in the air despite the conversation moving on. That was the first time he heard of Tom Riddle. A mere name that seemed to hold far more weight than it should. When he’d said it aloud in his room, it sounded sweet on his tongue, pleasant and simple, though somehow so memorable. A name that burrowed into his skull and sat there festering. It crept to the surface at unexpected and often unwelcome times, when he’d be listening to the professor’s drone and the constant creaking of wood as people shifted, tapping their feet and waiting to leave. That name would come to him again. It would drift into his consciousness and haze out the world around him. The tapping and the creaking and the droning would all melt into a single hum, and he’d be at liberty to imagine the type of person that such a name belonged to. It always made the time go quicker, made everything more interesting. From that single name, he formed a friend who was like himself, and so very different from all the others.  
~  
Harry wasn’t ashamed to admit he had started to listen out for that name, listen out for scraps of information that could possibly shine a light on who his imagined friend truly was. He found that that name was always accompanied by several others: Malfoy, Lestrange, Avery, Rosier and his sister Druella, in various configurations, always flowered with compliments and praise and admiration. Never anything else. Never a bad word nor condemnation nor criticism, only ever compliments. A constant stream of exultation for all those names, how they were simply perfect. The stars of their generation destined to shine far brighter than anyone else, to light up the lower-class’ world with their discoveries, _they_ would be the ones who would carve the future in their image and make the world a better place. All without the slightest vestige of arrogance or superiority, merely unending humility and temperance and benevolence. Harry couldn’t see how anyone could be capable of such undeniable perfection without being completely insufferable, but he supposed he hadn’t met the owner of those names yet. Though he felt he had. He felt as though he knew all of them, and that he had known them for a long time now. To him, they were _almost_ friends.  
~  
People said he looked like Riddle, and they always said Riddle, never Tom. Though they always qualified it, said it was like looking at Riddle through a misted mirror, or a windowpane blurred by the rain. Harry wasn’t sure whether it was a compliment or not, to be told he looked like someone he’d never met. That didn’t stop him wondering though, didn’t stop him staring into the mirrors above the sink long after he should have been asleep, and imagining someone who did and didn’t look like him. Someone that everyone knew their name, but didn’t dare to use half of it, someone who everyone admired without ever really saying why, someone that everyone seemed to know, and yet none were friends with. Staring at himself in the glass he couldn’t help but wonder what sort of person could fashion such a faultless reputation, what sort of human being managed to be so flawless, that everyone was simply dying to lick the dirt at their feet. It was distracting. Far too distracting, and it shouldn’t have been. He didn’t know Tom, and so he really had no right to infect his life like this. To distract him from everything he was supposed to be achieving. So, he made himself a mantra, “I will not get distracted.” He repeated it to himself in front of the mirror, “I will not get distracted, I will not get distracted, I will not get distracted.”  
He repeated it every night, and yet, every night he found himself back in front of the mirror, his mind turning over the same questions again and again and again. Always wondering how he could have ever got so caught up in a name.  
~  
It wasn’t long before he got to see the thing that had plagued his head ever since he’d first heard it. He first saw his doppelganger sitting on the grass outside the library, surrounded by those he could only suppose were the faces that the other names belonged to. Just six figures sitting on the grass under the October sun looking devastatingly perfect. Even from this distance, he could tell they were different, something in the air around them was so distinct. They were rich, but not in the way everyone else was, with they came a sophistication and a glamour, even when they were only sitting in the autumn sun, laughing with each other, so confident in their own existence that nothing else in the world mattered to them. It kept him staring at them long after it was appropriate, not that they seemed to care. They were too busy laughing and talking, sprawled across the grass in a way that almost offended moral decency. Almost. A tangle of arms and legs, bags and books, fingers and mouth that were so offensively beautiful Harry felt he might choke on it. He wanted to look away, pretend that he wasn’t as affected as everyone else, that he hadn’t fallen for them in the way that everyone else had. But it was as if their very presence has cast fishing hooks into his eyes and were now reeling him in as their next meal. He knew then, standing and watching them all lie in the last warm sun of the year that he wanted to be them, he wanted to lie with them, and that he would do _anything_ in the world be granted that privilege; to be with them, to _belong_ in their exclusive little group.  
~  
He didn’t work that afternoon. Only stared at his book and saw words that seemed to describe them. The _wealth_ that clung to every inch of them, the _talents_ that though he’d never seen, seemed to be such common knowledge that he’d be a fool to deny it, the _perfect combinations_ of everything in the world. They were simply _God’s design_. It was pathetic of him really, and he knew it was, pathetic that he should even care about these people that he knew nothing about. That he should be so distracted by the colours of their hair under the sun, and the way they raised their arms and tipped back their heads that he couldn’t even focus on the simplest thing. But he was. He was hopelessly distracted. He should be ashamed. But he wasn’t. He couldn’t quite bring himself to be, after all, he had already dedicated so much of his existence to these people, spent so many minutes standing in front of the mirror, wondering whether in another life he could have been with them now. They already felt like part of him, like the friends he’d never been allowed to have before, and that, for the first time in his life he felt as though he was meant for something, that this was his purpose to sit alongside them. To be one of them.  
~  
They were still there when he eventually gave up and abandoned the library, and though Harry knew he shouldn’t, he couldn’t help but indulge himself. He sat just across from them, blurred by the shadows, and hidden behind a book. If they knew he was lurking there they didn’t seem to care. He assumed it was the Rosier twins that were closest to him, given that they looked eerily similar. They were very close, their fingertips touching and thighs converging as they lay with the setting sun sliding over their faces, apparently not having any other care in the world than for the warm glow of gold licking their throats. Next to them was at a guess either Lestrange or Avery, leaning back on his hands and passing out smiles like sweets to children. He was talking loudly to the person opposite him, whom he seemed to address as Avery, so it was probably Lestrange. He was gesturing wildly with his hands and whining about some finer point of something that Harry didn’t especially care to hear. Avery was listening though, sitting half in the shade, legs crossed, and his face drawn into a glare, waiting for Lestrange to let him get a word in edgeways. Between them were Malfoy and Tom. Harry knew he was deliberately not looking at Tom, painfully examining all the others, drawing it out longer than it needed to be, teasing himself for reasons he didn’t want to examine. He didn’t stop though. Instead, he watched how Malfoy was lying on his back, his hand beneath his head nodding along to whatever Lestrange was saying, though not hesitating to occasionally interject by raising his hand and knocking Lestrange off his rhythm. He was by far the prettiest of them, with a delicacy in his smile and an almost femininity to his features. Malfoy simply looked like he was made of the porcelain that was only found behind the glass of cabinets Harry had never been allowed to touch. They were all nice to look at, more than nice, but Harry knew who it was that he had been avoiding looking at. Tom was sitting just behind Malfoy, looking vaguely interested in what they were saying, though all the time his fingers were picking at the grass, pulling up individual blades and scattering them in Malfoy’s hair. Malfoy didn’t seem to notice. Harry was slow to let his eyes drag past Tom’s hands and up his wrists, and along his neck. There was a thrill to taking it so slow, dragging it out just to torment himself. But Tom was somehow special, like a single orchid in a bed of irises, all of them were beautiful, just Tom was that much rarer, that much more eye-catching. Seeing him properly for the first time, with the sun splayed over his face, it was clear to see that they did look alike. The same hair, same deep shadows around their eyes, the same way of tilting their head back when someone was droning for too long. They were curiously similar. But not identical, everything about Tom was sharper, lines cut more definitely, more distinctly. Everything was structured and defined, and perfect; Tom stunning where Harry was only ordinary, and it was physically sickening, painful to keep his eyes on him and yet just as painful to look away.  
~  
Harry could have stayed staring at Tom forever, only Tom glanced up, as if sensing someone had been looking at him too long. Their eyes met. Tom’s face bright and stained with sun, and Harry’s dark and clouded with shade. Harry took a moment too long to react and then looked down at his book faster than he meant to. He felt his face flush and a knot of embarrassment forming in his stomach, as though he were a child caught stealing sweets from a drawer. It was several awkward minutes of staring at the words, reading the same sentence over and over again, hoping for enlightenment, before Harry trusted himself to look back up again. Tom had turned away from him and returned his gaze to Avery’s trivial discussion. The damage was done though. Somehow with nothing more than a gaze, Tom had managed to rip a hole straight through him, and Harry could already feel something settling in the base of his churning stomach, like seeds being planted in a ploughed field. He didn’t know exactly what he wanted, but he knew it involved Tom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m sorry if this goes a little fast, I hate beginnings so I usually try and get them over with too quickly, I’ll try and slow it down a bit in future.


	2. ab initio

Harry dumped his stuff on the desk and sat down in the library, as usual, he had arrived early enough that no one else had taken his seat, and _they_ were not yet studying. It hadn’t taken long to discover all of them were night-owls, much preferring to stay in the library until they were asked to leave than to arrive early. Especially as sometimes, when they just smiled and said something no one ever heard to the warden, they were permitted to stay for as long as they wanted. Harry had seen it once, when he was standing behind a bookshelf, quietly gathering his stuff together. Just pretty smiles from Tom and the murmuring from Malfoy, and they were permitted to remain as they were, when everyone else had to go. Not that the library was particularly busy at eleven o clock, but still. There was a power in being able to twist the rules like that, to know they were the only ones who got to do it. Harry would be very much lying if he said _he_ didn’t want that sort of power. 

To be honest though, it was probably good that they were all night owls, if they’d been early risers Harry doubted that he’d ever get work done, for, as much as he had promised himself in front of mirrors that he would not get distracted, they were the single biggest distraction in his life. One which wasn’t going to go away any time soon.  
So, he supposed it was good in some way that they tended not to arrive until the afternoon, Harry often wondered where they were in the mornings. On weekdays he supposed they were in their lectures, but on the weekends, there was never any sign of them, anywhere, and Harry had looked extensively for them. Harry liked to sit in the library and daydream, imagine what things they could be doing, whether Tom did the things that he himself did, whether they were as connected in their methods of work as in their looks.  
When they all finally did arrive, they’d arrive together. They _always_ walked together when they could, an exclusive group that all moved as one, almost gliding across the floor demonstrating themselves to be the epitome of elegance, of glamour, of the utter perfection of human bodies. Tom always at the forefront, people parted almost biblically for them, and Harry was the same, stepping to the side if he saw them coming, as a group or alone down the corridor. He would step aside and watch, staring at them as they passed, just watching their mouth twitch into a smile, or the flexing of their hands or, even the scent of their cologne, always distinctive, hanging in the air, reminding people of whose presence they had been in. It felt in those moments that the world slowed, that time stretched out and Harry could see before him every tiny detail of those people who were more than merely human. He wondered whether they ever saw him in the corner, whether they saw him, whether they wondered. He hoped they did. He hoped that Tom wondered about the first-year that looked like him when he passed him by in the corridor. But he didn’t hold out much hope, no one ever seemed to notice him. 

Harry wasn’t really sure whether he should be pleased or suspicious of how easy it had been to find out about the six of them, because he _had_ to find out more. Information had practically been plastered on the walls, quite literally in some cases. The Law department itself had the Lestrange library, created it said on the plaque outside, with the funds so generously donated by the Lestrange family. Harry tried not to use that library. Apparently, the physics department’s new laboratory was as a result of a similar act of generosity, this time by the Rosiers, though that was less common knowledge, and Harry only knew because he’d heard two physics students discussing it in the boys bathroom on the fifth floor, and he’d only been there because he was avoiding a seminar he didn’t want to go to. 

The rest of his investigations were answered by other people’s mouths. The first word that always rolled off people’s tongues when those six were mentioned, was ‘ _rich_ ’ usually quickly followed by ‘ _attractive_ ’ and rounded off with ‘ _intelligent_ ’. That was the holy trinity of repute. Money, beauty and intellect; they were all things that Harry dreamed of having and yet he lacked those simple facts that gave _them_ the key to door after door, and those who lacked them access to nothing at all. On the surface the most powerful of those was beauty, it was certainly the most eye-catching, and Harry was sure that was why most people initially fell in love with them. But after a while, it became clear it was their money that was what made people stay.  
Before he’d arrived here, Harry had assumed that people were either poor or they were wealthy, but apparently that wasn’t the case; apparently, there were multiple strata of wealth, from moderate to painful, and the Rosiers, Lestranges and Malfoys were right at the top of that hierarchy. The sort of old money that made even privileged students roll their eyes, the sort of money that needed qualifiers: _filthy_ rich, _horribly_ rich, _disgustingly_ rich. People said it was sickening that they could have so much money, but that didn’t stop any of them being almost sycophantically polite whenever they passed by in the corridor because, in the end, money was what made gods in this world, and everyone wanted to be in the god’s favour. 

Each of the six had varying degrees of access to varying degrees of family money, on one end of the scale was Avery, provided with only a moderate allowance, at the other, was Malfoy whose funds appeared, unlimited. Well, actually, as Harry had found out in the fourth week, not all of them were from money. Tom didn’t have family funds, or funds of any kind. He was apparently a scholarship student, just like Harry. It somehow didn’t surprise him, Tom had that appearance about him, it wasn’t quite modesty, more of an arrogance born out of his innate talents as opposed to the depths of his pockets. That somehow made him better than the others, to know that Tom was here from his own hard work, and not at the recompense of some old favour on the part of the university. It made him more human, more real, more like him, and though Harry wouldn’t admit it to anyone, that made him smile. Of all the people to be like in the world, Tom was one of the better ones.  
The rest of them only confused Harry because he wasn’t sure why he was attracted to them, but he was. They should have been everything he despised. The people who had been born with silver spoons in their mouths, never having to work to get what they wanted were typically his least favourites. Their privilege disgusted him, but if someone like Tom was hanging around with them, maybe they weren’t so bad? Anyway, they weren’t exactly like the people that Harry so despised. Those people didn’t even try, they were just here because they could be, because it was what their fathers did, and their grandfathers and their great-grandfathers. These six people were as intelligent as they were rich. Not to mention that Tom wasn’t like them, Tom was an outsider now on the inside, and if Tom could do it, why couldn’t he? Well, Harry knew the answer to that, because Tom was handsome and talented and everyone liked him. Nobody even knew enough about Harry to have an opinion. 

Those were the reasons that Harry found himself coming back to this same spot to watch them day after day, at least that’s what he told himself. That and the hopeless belief that maybe one day they would notice him, and watch him too, and maybe, just maybe he could join them. Deep in his heart, Harry knew it was a hopeless fantasy, but that didn’t stop him from dreaming it anyway. He’d spent his whole life dreaming of things that he thought couldn’t be true, but some of them had been realised. Getting away from the remnants of ‘family’ he still had, going to university, they had both been dreams that came true, so maybe there was hope that one more dream could come true if he wished for it enough. 

At first, he had tried to avoid them, but they always seemed to be where he wanted to go. Their favourite corner in the library, the one that was hidden down endless corridors of advanced mathematics, philosophy and theology no one ever read, was also his favourite corner. It was quiet and empty, and it had them in it. He couldn’t remember when the lines started blurring together, whether it had always been his favourite spot, or whether it had become his favourite because of them.  
Through some innate skill, they made what could have been a dreary corner, dipped in dark shadows, pleasant. As the evening sun began to fade, and their evenings were just getting started, it was their voices that continued to light the room, and their voices could be loud when they were discussing something particularly contentious, or at least Lestrange’s could be.  
When Harry had mentioned his name to all the vague acquaintances he had acquired, none of them friends, but all people that he at least knew the name of, they would all roll their eyes, as by all accounts, Lestrange was a legitimate nightmare, perpetually smug and perpetually arrogant; he was a future barrister with a talent for making people tongue-tied. He was in his fourth year of reading for the infamous Politics, Philosophy and Law degree that half of academia felt was the holy grail of degrees, and the rest thought was superfluous. It was the same degree that Tom was reading for, and no matter what the opinion on it was, it seemed to be accompanied by some academic prowess that even the disciplines of medicine failed to command.  
It was exactly the type of subject Harry expected Tom would study, pleasantly challenging, deeply intellectual and incredibly impressive, because whilst Tom said nothing, he seemed like the type of person to crave respect, attention, and success. Harry only knew because he too felt those things, that need to be seen after having been ignored for so long. He could feel it in Tom, see it in his method of study, and in his smile, charming but ambitious in a way Harry couldn’t quite put into words but could almost feel in the pit of his stomach. The only real difference between the two of them was that Tom had realised his dreams, he _was_ seen, Harry still wasn’t. 

Of course, not all of them were reading for such a complex degree, and at the opposite end of the academic spectra was the Rosier twins with their ‘adorable’, to quote Lestrange as he’d passed Harry on the stairs, study of Philosophy. Everyone that Harry spoke to scoffed at Philosophy and called it an irrational subject, pursued only by those who failed to understand the law. Regardless of such opinions, Rosier and Druella were both reading for a Philosophy degree, though most people said they rarely read anything, not that that stopped them from writing gorgeous essays. Harry desperately wanted to read one of their infamous essays, to learn what it was about them that made those two so extraordinary, so different from everyone else and whether that special quality was detectable simply in their words on a page. Though Harry had heard, when standing surreptitiously by the water fountain in the philosophy department, waiting, and rather hoping to catch a glimpse of them, and Tom when they left their only joint seminar, that many people thought the Rosiers cheated on their essays. But that no one had ever admitted to sharing or writing said essays for them; other people said they bribed the professors, but everyone who’d ever read a Rosier essay said they were up to standard. So how they seemed to do so little and yet achieve so much, still remained a departmental mystery. 

In the privacy of his own thoughts, Harry wouldn’t lie to himself, there were other interesting things about the Rosiers, besides their pursuit of something so deeply unpopular. He liked to watch Druella as she traced her elegant fingers over her brother’s knuckles. They never talked as much as the others, always stuck in their only little world, one that no one seemed to be able to reach no matter how hard they tried. Malfoy tried the hardest, easy smiles for Druella, each one filled with less than innocent invitations. Druella never returned those smiles, well, she did smile back and nod, but then her eyes glazed over again, and she went back to her own little world, where her only companion was her brother.  
The rational part of Harry’s brain thought it was a shame she showed no interest in Malfoy, they would have made a nice couple, all white skin and pale eyes and blonde hair. However, the irrational part of him was delighted in a way that he couldn’t quite explain but certainly knew was wrong. That impulsive irrationality had nearly got him in trouble at least three times now, it’d nearly got him caught, staring right at Malfoy whenever he was sitting outside the library because Malfoy was just so good to stare at. Somehow, and even from a distance, he exuded an aura Harry hadn’t thought someone could possess, it was so confident and self-assured, as though he knew exactly what everyone else was thinking, and exactly how to respond in order to get what he wanted. Malfoy was a politician in the making, smooth woods and slick statements that soothed troubled mind but never solved any problems. Naturally, he was in his third year of reading Politics, Philosophy and Economics, and excelling at all of them with that infuriating ‘natural gift’ always given to the people who already have everything. Harry had quickly learnt Malfoy was not like Tom, for Tom there was never a bad word to be spoken, he was just that exceptional student with good looks and a future as a someone. Malfoy had all those things as well, but they were interwoven with a cruelty, or rather a ruthlessness that made him admirable but unlikeable but those who wanted everyone to get along. Harry had heard plenty of stories of what Malfoy was willing to do to get what he wanted. Most of them uncorroborated, but reliable enough to get a picture of what sort of person Malfoy could be when he was sick of smiling.  
The only person Harry wanted to be smiling, was Tom. He wanted Tom to smile, Tom to smile at _him_ with those easy smiles. He wanted Tom to invite him over and think that he was interesting, that he was worthy of sitting with them, and talking with them, and being one of them. But Tom wasn’t like that. He didn’t have easy smiles for people, he had politeness and pleasantness, the bare minimum he needed for people to like him. but Harry kept watching when the others looked away, he saw Tom’s smile curl into something that balanced perfectly between gorgeous and nasty. Harry saw it and wanted it, somehow, he wasn’t sure if he wanted to replicate it, or just see it, or something else entirely. Something that lurked on the edge of his consciousness, growing stronger the longer he looked at Tom. But Tom never seemed to look back. Instead, he stayed his aloof self, always slightly apart from the others, as though, somehow, despite their talents and their wealth and their beauty, they were still beneath him, and he would rather not associate with what he deemed to be beneath him. 

At least that was how Harry interpreted the sight from the corner of the room. The sight that was once again in front of him today. Tom was still sitting, apart from the other, at the head of the table by the window, the deepening glow of the sun heavy on his back, blurring his sharp features into shadows. He had a book in front of him, something thick and old and not in English because to read in English was another thing that Tom deemed to be beneath him. At a guess, Harry would say it was Latin, but equally, it could have been Greek or any other language from a dead time that Tom appeared to want to reawaken.  
As real and intriguing though as Harry supposed the book must be to those who were interested in such things, it was obvious that Tom was only half-reading it, the other half of his attention was on the conversation hovering in the room. He was attentive whilst somehow looking uninterested, keeping just enough attention to act as an apparent censor, coughing when the conversations strayed to something, he deemed to be inappropriate. Not that Harry could ever figure out why he wouldn’t want them talking about such uninteresting things as what Malfoy had been doing over the summer, or any mention of a person called Mulciber that Tom didn’t seem to like much. But apparently these were things Tom didn’t feel it was necessary to discuss, and all the others just listened to him, and let the conversation slide elsewhere without so much as batting an eyelid. Harry would have loved to have that sort of throbbing control over people, so palpable in the air that it stuck to the back of his throat and made his stomach squeeze. 

Harry knew that he shouldn’t be watching, no matter how interesting they all were, but they hadn’t noticed him yet and the temptation was just too much. To give himself credit, he was trying his utmost not to be seen. Hiding with the wobbling desk in the alcove. It was dark and a little colder, but the view of Tom was exceptional. It showed his profile to perfection, and Harry just like to watch him and chew on his lip, crushing it between his teeth whenever Tom shifted, whenever he swallowed, whenever he moved in any way at all, because Harry knew those movements would stick to the walls of his brain forever, making appearances in his daytime preoccupations and his dreams. He wouldn’t acknowledge that it was Tom he saw standing there in the shadows of his night-time imaginations, just standing there, smiling with his hands tapping against his thigh, but somewhere in his subconscious, Harry knew it was him. Besides, the close walls of the alcove were strangely comforting; it reminded Harry a little of home, and that was a comfort even if it was only the familiarity and routine that had ever been any comfort to him.  
Harry continued to watch as Tom rolled his neck, put down his book and cracked his knuckles, apparently taking pleasure in the way Lestrange winced and told him to cut it out. He didn’t, and it made Harry smile to see the perverse stare Tom gave Lestrange as he cracked each one of his fingers slowly, and individually, and the way he smiled at the single sharp syllable emitted from them. Lestrange rolled his eyes and went back to talk about something Harry didn’t care to listen to, he would have cared if Tom cared, but Tom didn’t, he just went back to his book. 

He shouldn’t be watching he thought to himself again, whilst knowing full well that he wasn’t going to do what he should be. He _should_ be reading cases and writing that essay on the formation of contracts, the one that was sitting half-finished in front of him, but Tom was distracting, even when he wasn’t meaning to be.  
So, Harry just laid his head against the coolness of the desk and watched. It was mesmerising to see Tom turn the pages of his book, tongue flicking to lick a finger before turning a page, and another and another. The flitting of paper seemed to cut through the conversation, reminding the others that they simply weren’t interesting enough to be awarded with Tom’s attention. Harry wished he had that sort of power over people, that sort of command that demanded respect whether people were inclined to give it or not.  
As he watched, wasting his time on Tom’s profile, he saw Tom’s eyes flick up, it was only momentary but also so noticeable. Tom’s gaze hovered for a second on the sixth, and in Harry’s eyes the most forgettable, member of their little coterie. Avery.  
Avery was odd, he had apparently started hanging around with them at the end of the previous semester, then had spent the summer with them, and now they were all acting like he had always been there. He was in his third year of reading Politics, and Harry sometimes saw him walking with Tom, eyes all big and star-struck, when the three of them passed at the intersection between the Law and Politics departments.  
There was something not quite right about Avery though, and it wasn’t just Harry who thought so, everyone else was suspicious as well. Suspicious as to how someone who wasn’t _that_ extraordinary had managed to worm their way into such an exclusive group. Most of the rumours seemed to involve Tom, but none of them was firmly established or had any grounds, and if Harry brought it up, people quickly shut their mouths and pretended to find nothing wrong with Avery at all.  
Even now when Avery was just sitting with the others, he was off, present but vacant. Just sitting there, hunched in on himself, keeping quiet as the discussion rolled and swelled, moving like a rock between topical waves. Harry suspected that was why, every so often, Tom would glance over at him, as if checking to see if he was still there, before sweeping his gaze back over all the others. The ones who were clearly more deserving of his attention. 

Currently, Tom's eyes had left behind Avery and were rested for too long on Malfoy, which was weird because he wasn’t talking. Malfoy hadn’t said much at all today, he was too busy actually writing an essay. Pen scratching loudly, him occasionally sighing but not asking questions to any of the others like he usually did. Harry supposed though he had no idea really, that Malfoy must be writing an economics essay, and thus all the others with their extensive but humanities-based knowledge, would be completely useless.  
Without Malfoy’s interjections, and with Tom’s apparent apathy, Lestrange had been left to monopolise the conversation, turning it into an endless drone about the intricacies of international shipping law, and by the way Druella was examining her nails, Rosier had his head in a book and Avery was staring absently at the ceiling, it wasn’t very interesting.  
The quietude was broken though, and Lestrange finally interrupted when Malfoy slammed his essay down into the centre of the table.  
“Ha Rosier, I told you I could write the sodding thing in forty minutes,” Malfoy said, sliding the pages over to him as if to emphasise their completion.  
Rosier dragged his head up with a glare before checking his watch and rolling his eyes, “I bet its useless,” he said, making no effort to actually look at the pages.  
Malfoy scoffed, “like you’d know, you couldn’t do international trade theory if your life depended on it.”  
“It can hardly be difficult if you’re doing it.”  
“Oh really?” said Malfoy, evidently getting irritated, “care to tell me what the Heckscher–Ohlin model is then? And while you’re at it, how about you tell me its relationship to the Ricardian model, and which one more accurately explains our trading patterns,” Malfoy continued, becoming more emphatic the more he spoke. Rosier only looked bored and made some unhelpful interjections that achieved nothing.  
Harry watched from his corner, expecting things to heat up pretty quickly as soon as Rosier spoke because he had a look that could only be described as completely devilish spreading over his features like he’d been saving up all his energy just to complete this one disproof. But before he could say anything Tom interrupted.  
“Do I actually have to remind you two that this is a library? Abraxas, care to be quiet? And Rosier, we _all_ know you failed economics, so don’t pretend you even have a chance at proving him wrong, and wipe that frankly Mephistophelian smile off your face, it doesn’t suit you.”  
With that, Tom returned to his book. The others sat in silence until Lestrange took Malfoy’s essay for proofreading, and Druella soothed circles on her brother’s knuckles, as though they were physical manifestations of his bruised ego. If any of them objected, none of them said anything. 

It was fascinating the control that Tom had without really trying, and Harry had to wonder what he’d done to deserve it, to so completely gain their respect, and he wondered whether he could do it too.  
He kept watching even as Tom shut his book and leaned closer at Lestrange’s request, looking at something in Malfoy’s essay.  
Harry knew shouldn’t, he really shouldn’t, but that hadn’t stopped him yet. He couldn’t help moving his chair a couple of inches just to get a better view of Tom. The wood though had other ideas, and the legs of the chair screeched loudly over the wooden floor, and six faces turned to the corner. Before their eyes had even properly settled on him, Harry could feel himself flushing. The tightness slithering back into his stomach, like it had when Tom first noticed him. He turned his face away, only darting his eyes up enough to see Tom tilt his head to the left and narrow his own eyes like he was trying to place where he had seen him before.  
It was stupid and Harry cursed himself for staring back so gormlessly. Though Tom didn’t seem to care. He only continued to watch until Harry could feel a prickling on his skin and a fizzing in the air Tom’s eyes roaming across his face, examining him carefully and for considerably longer than he needed to. For every extra second that passed whatever it was in Harry’s stomach seemed to squeeze tighter, and he never wanted Tom to look away.  
“Care to enlighten us with what you were doing?” asked Tom, eyes still heavy on Harry’s.  
Harry shook his head awkwardly, “no,” he said in the smallest stickiest voice anyone could imagine. He didn’t give them another chance to speak, gathering his stuff into his bag too quickly and getting up and out of the room before they could ask him anything else. Before Tom could recognise him, if he hadn’t already, like the one under the tree, and the one in the corridor, and by the water fountain, and in all the places he was. Because if Tom knew, if Tom realised how much Harry watched, he might accuse him of stalking, which this wasn’t. It was merely a fantasy; one he knew wouldn’t come true because life simply wasn’t kind to people who had nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know the PPL degree wasn't a thing in the 1930s, but I just love it so much that I had to include it regardless.


	3. animus revertendi

Harry did not go back to the library the next day, or the next or the next. He was quite tempted to never to go back there again, and that could have worked. He could have studied in his room. He certainly spent enough time there already, venturing out once or twice for a lecture before retreating, back into that sunless, airless, loveless room that he had come to like. Although it was small, there was no one to invade his thoughts, no one to inquire what he was doing as he stared at them from across the room. There was no one here at all. Even the others that supposedly lived with him, albeit in their separate rooms, were usually out. They had better things to do that to hang around and study.  
So, it was quiet and pleasant and perfectly nice, but it had nothing on the library. Nothing on the high ceilings and warm mustiness that infected all the, more abandoned, corridors. This room had no wide staircases or tall windows; nor did it have the low murmuring of conversation, and pages turning, and the click of girl’s heels on the wooden floors. Most importantly though, it didn’t have _them_. In this room, there was no wit or wisdom save Harry’s own, and he was quickly becoming convinced that he was significantly lacking. Without going to the library, he had no surreptitious opportunity to gawk and gape and gaze at people who were so much better than himself. Instead, he had to catch any glance he could, wherever he could find it, and however pathetic it made him feel for doing so. 

It was almost predictable, but Harry had resorted back to the same thing he always did when he felt alone. He retreated into fantasy. He liked to pretend that the person he watched in his room’s small mirror when he daydreamed, was not himself, but Tom. He liked to imagine the conversations that they could have together, and the smile on Tom’s face when he found that Harry was far more interesting than anyone had ever given him credit for. That he was a someone, and that Tom wanted to know more about him. Harry had more fantasies like that than he’d care to admit, and they always ended the same, Tom lying beside him on the bed and telling him all the wonderful things he could be if they stuck together.  
It was hard to leave his room after those sorts of daydreams, they just seemed too real, too distracting, too _perfect_. In half an hour of staring, he managed to encapsulate every feeling he had, and it wasn’t just for Tom, at least, that’s what he told himself, he liked all the others as well. It was just harder to picture them because they didn’t share his features. When he thought of it like that, he was ever so grateful that he and Tom looked so similar. If they hadn’t, it would have been that much harder to see him across the room with that perfect smile, and perfect face and perfect everything. Harry sighed. He knew he wouldn’t be able to avoid Tom, he just _had_ to see him again, had to give in to this unhealthy interest. 

Harry wasn’t sure where the line between stalking and being generally interested was anymore, and no matter how much he tried to avoid them, and he did try a little, he always ended up so close, anyway that he might as well watch them. He would use the water fountain in a side corridor, and they’d all be there, coming out of a classroom. He’d be waiting for a lecture on the fifth floor surrounded by other, more confident students, and he’d see Rosier and Lestrange leaving after a philosophy lecture. He’d been going the back way, through the mess of the politics department, to the exit that was always quiet, and he’d come across Malfoy and Avery loudly discussing the merits of democracy. Although he had not dared to look, he’d felt Malfoy’s eyes follow him as he rounded the corner. The worst one though had been seeing Tom leave a seminar with Druella. They walked too close together in his opinion, their hands occasionally touching, brief smiles flitting over their faces.  
Harry had, for a moment, wondered if they were dating and simply hadn’t cared to mention it. The way they looked at each other suggested it, but then again, if he thought back to the library, Tom had never sat next to Druella, nor had his gaze strayed to her unless she was speaking, neither had hers strayed to him. The only person he’d seen Druella’s eyes linger on was her brother. But whatever it was that was between them, Harry wished that Tom would look at _him_ like that, to take that much interest in the things _he_ said, but that couldn’t happen because he was only ordinary. He was only him. 

Though for all the time that Harry spent, honestly inadvertently, watching them, he was also getting the feeling of being watched himself. Sometimes when he was standing alone in the corridor, Harry would swear he could feel the warmth of someone’s stare on the back of his neck, but when he turned there’d be no one there. Sometimes he’d catch the flash of dark eyes and sharpness of someone’s jaw turning away. Someone who looked a lot like Tom, but he brushed it off as a lookalike staring at the pretty girl standing behind him, or the glint of the light on some object that had no life within it because Tom wouldn’t look at him. It was all just him projecting the things he wanted to happen into the real world, his fantasies spilling over because that was the one thing, he had always been good at, daydreaming. It was a skill acquired by being ignored and finetuned by being alone, and now used more than he had ever done before. When no one paid any attention to him, he had had no one else to entertain him but himself, so Harry would like to think he’d gotten rather good at it. Though, he knew, in his heart, he’d much prefer it if it had been someone watching him. But he suspected someone being interested in him was more than he could hope for. 

Once when he was feeling particularly reckless, and had nothing better to do, Harry had even arrived early to his own lecture, early enough that he could sit in on the one before. The one Lestrange and Rosier attended. He told himself it was just because the scribbles that he’d seen on the blackboard when he went in for his lecture interested him. But it wasn’t. It was because he wanted to see them because if he couldn’t see Tom then he’d have to satisfy that ache inside himself with the others. Harry couldn’t even pretend he knew anything about advanced propositional logic, or what in the world proofs for truth-functional relations were. To him, they resembled a foreign language, and he took on the role of a hapless tourist who knew nothing of local dialects, but he did know that Lestrange and Rosier certainly understood what they were talking about. They answered questions and asked questions and were practically model students, and probably would have been called such if Rosier didn’t roll his eyes so often and Lestrange would refrain from obnoxiously calling out flaws in the professor’s logic. But they were forgiven their misdemeanours because they were clever and handsome and rich and because everybody liked them. After that, Harry had sat in on that class again just to watch them, just to hear them being brilliant, and to sate that need inside him. 

He did with the others too, though he knew in some way that it was wrong, and definitely starting to cross that line of appropriateness. He made a point of arriving early and then lurking just around the corner to where Malfoy and Avery liked to debate as they waited for their tutorial. They never saw him, and he doubted whether they even realised there was someone there. They had no reason to because he kept ever so quiet and they were loud enough to cover any noise he did make. From what he heard, their arguments were intelligent and eloquent, and they always disagreed, especially with regards to the role of democracy. Avery seemed to represent the more moral view, strong constitutions, heavy scrutiny, the role of the people. Malfoy was a lot more casual with regards to it all, ready to throw away everything at the slightest inconvenience, stressing _flexibility_ , he said, though it sounded more like thinly veiled elitism. Regardless, Avery was the always the one to dissolve first, he sounded inexperienced compared to Malfoy and could never defend himself without flipping through his notes. At least that’s what Harry assumed he was doing every time he heard the shuffling of paper and faltering sentences. Just listening to them, and to Malfoy in particular, was like taking a shot of something sharp and strong, something with a sour edge, and Harry loved it. That’s why he never stopped listening, even when he knew he should. 

It was different though when he’d waited for Tom and Druella. He knew they always left the room together, long after everyone else, and then they’d walk together up to the fourth floor where they’d meet Lestrange and Malfoy, and then they’d all go to the library together, and Harry wouldn’t follow because he was embarrassed. That embarrassment did not stop him from waiting by the line of old lockers though, pretending for too long to be fiddling with his key. Nor did it stop him from watching them leave the classroom, and listening to Tom explain the failures of the Rule Utilitarian’s position, and see Druella nod along sorting through the logical steps in her head, before forcing him to backtrack and clarify something. She kept him on his toes, and he seemed to like her for it. He seemed to appreciate a challenge, and enjoy the repartee that ricocheted between them. It was as they climbed the stairs, and Druella had said something particularly clever, that Harry wished more than ever that he had her wit. Because Tom was looking at her like she meant the world, like she had the answer to every question he could think of ever asking. Even as they walked, Harry trying to balance being able to see and hear them, and walking too close, he could see the smile that slowly materialised at the corner of Tom’s mouth.  
“You are brilliant, Druella,” he said, smiling and leaning too close again.  
“Of course, I am. I’m frankly insulted that you’d even dare to think otherwise,” she said waiting on the landing as Tom pulled open the door and held it for her.  
Tom was still smiling when he turned back to the stairway to see if he should continue to hold the door. And although Harry had tried quickly to turn around and go back down the stairs, he knew Tom had seen him. Again. 

Harry wasn’t _trying_ to catch Tom’s attention, though he knew he’d like it, like it more than most people because there were things that Harry had known before he’d come here. Things that he’d realised when he was still at school. Ever since he’d become a teenager, Harry had known there was something unusual inside his head, something that made him different, though he hadn’t realised what it was for far too long.  
It had started, he decided, when he’d overheard the older boys talking about the girls in their year. Privately, Harry had agreed with what they said, not always with their choice of words, but certainly with the sentiment. Girls were lovely and beautiful, and they made his insides melt whenever they smiled at him in _that_ way. But, despite that, he’d always felt there was something more, or more accurately, that there was something missing from girls. There was still a space, a huge void, that hung heavy inside him, and he just didn’t know quite how to fill it. Then Cedric happened. Well, perhaps it was wrong to say happened because nothing really _happened_. Not externally at least, everything that changed had been inside Harry’s head.  
Cedric was a new student, a good all-rounder that everyone liked, including Harry, but he guessed his motivations for liking Cedric were not the same as all the other boys. They all liked him because he was good at sports and because he made intelligence look effortless. The girls liked him too because he was handsome and polite and much more mature than all the other boys. Harry liked him for all the above reasons. He liked how Cedric really looked at him when they played sports together, it made him feel important, like he meant something, like he was a someone. 

It was in the summer when Harry was about to turn fifteen, that it had all crystallised before him. He and Cedric had been sitting, just the two of them, on the stone steps watching the sun dip over the edge of the world. Cedric talking about something and Harry listening because listening to Cedric had been the best thing in the world. Listening and watching his jaw and his mouth, and wondering how soft his lips were, and Harry had realised quite suddenly that he wanted to kiss Cedric. That he wanted to touch Cedric’s fingers and touch his lips and just… kiss him. He hadn’t said anything though, he’d just felt awkward and nervous, and let his stomach tie itself in knots as Cedric had remained, well he hoped he had, oblivious to the things Harry wanted to do.  
Even now, three years later, Harry remembered every minute detail of that day. The curling shadows that covered Cedric’s face, the fluttering of his lashes, how his fingers tapped to a silent tune on the stone. And Harry could remember every single emotion that had passed through his own head. The hammering of his heart as he thought of just reaching out and touching Cedric’s fingers, how tight his throat had felt when he thought of holding Cedric’s hand, and how generally uncomfortable the atmosphere between them had become. When Cedric had said goodbye and left him alone on the step, Harry had laid back, eyes watching the stars as they started coming out, and wondering what this all meant.  
In his head, he’d passed over so many faces, so many times that his heart had just stopped when he’d seen someone beautiful. There were more boys than he remembered seared into his memory. More half-smiles and heads resting on arms and fingers accidentally brushing his own, than Harry cared to remember. He’d always liked watching the boys in his year, he’d thought he just wanted to be them, but maybe it wasn’t that, and maybe in some way, he’d always known. He didn’t just want to look, he wanted to touch. To feel boys’ jaws and necks, mouths and thighs. He’d wanted to kiss them, and he wanted them to kiss him back. 

But despite all that he also knew it was wrong. Somewhere in his periphery, he understood that to have such wants were not compatible with society. That for whatever reason, to feel like he did, was wrong, and he should be ashamed. So, he didn’t tell anyone how he felt. Or, at least, he didn’t say anything with his mouth, only with his eyes. Once, he’d thought Cedric saw, thought that maybe he understood what he was feeling, and maybe, just maybe he felt it too. But Cedric died that summer; before Harry had ever had a chance to ask him.  
He didn’t say anything after that. He just stayed silent and resorted to looking and hoping that someone would see something in his eyes, and they would understand what it was that he was feeling. No one had. Well, Harry sighed, he didn’t want to get his hopes up, but Tom was the first person since Cedric to make his heart turn to butterflies.  
In a strange respect, Tom reminded him of Cedric, but in a darker, warmer way. Back when he was fifteen, Cedric had seemed so cold and distant like the star’s pale beauty. Something foreign and otherworldly, just outside of his reach but forever in his gaze. In contrast, Tom was like the sun, burning Harry’s world up one subtle glance at a time. He wanted to reach out to Tom, to feel his fingers burn and all the butterflies in his heart turn to ashes and flutter out across the sky –  
“ – You, third row, glasses, care to prove that you’re actually awake this morning and tell me the facts of Stilk and Merrick?”  
Harry snapped back into it, flushing and stuttering. He was in a lecture and everyone was looking at him and he had no idea what to say. 

Usually, Harry brought his own lunch, usually, but today he’d been unorganised, too busy thinking about people he shouldn’t have, to pick anything up. That was why he was in the cafeteria. He could have gone to another one, a small café down a side street and away from all these people, but that had just seemed slightly too much effort. So, he was here. They were too. He’d seen them as soon as he walked in. How could he not? They were sitting at a corner table, and a wide radius had been left around them like everyone knew not to interfere.  
Every so often, someone would go over. Harry assumed they took a class with one of them because they’d stand awkwardly and ask something. The whole table shushed whenever anyone approached and they’d all stare at the person who deigned to interrupt them. Then whoever was addressed would answer politely and they’d all continue to smile until the person had turned their back, and started to walk away. That was when that nice-nasty smile returned to Tom’s face, and Harry would feel his stomach curl a little. 

When they weren’t talking to someone, they were just eating, like normal human beings. Though even that Tom seemed to make look agonisingly perfect. It was frankly unbearable to watch Tom eat an apple right down to the core, white teeth biting just so and little teasing flashes of his tongue. He was listening intently to Malfoy, and less intently to everyone, and just continuing to bite at the flesh of that apple as if nothing else in the world mattered. Harry wasn’t sure how someone managed to make eating look so sophisticated, but he wished Tom would teach him. Teach him how to curl his wrist and tilt his head and chew in a way that was just so… provocative.  
Harry knew he was the exact opposite as he sat, alone, eating just a sandwich because he was not wasting any more of his money than was absolutely necessary here. There were more important things to do than buy food. He knew he looked small and tense and primitive, a sandwich in his short fingers, crumbs in his textbook. He was nothing like Tom. He was nothing like any of them. 

Harry dared to take another glance. Tom was leaning over and talking to Malfoy, the others were talking loudly and laughing with each other, like they had been the first time he’d seen them. In any other setting Harry would have been able to hear their conversation, and, in a small way, feel part of it, but here, surrounded by nearly a hundred people, it was clamorous and chaotic and he could hardly hear his own thoughts, let alone anyone else’s conversations. But that didn’t stop him looking. It didn’t stop him dreaming. It didn’t stop him wanting more than anything else in the world for them to notice him.  
Suddenly someone tripped and a plate fell to the floor, a crash followed by an eruption of noise spread around the room, people standing and shouting. But not them. They didn’t even move. The six of them looked over at the commotion, but continued to just sit calmly and quietly, waiting for all the fuss to blow over. Harry wished he could be that smooth, that polished, that poised, completely in control of the situation, even if he wasn’t really. He stopped looking at them, after all, what was the point in dreaming?

He was trying to read his textbook and ignore the moving of chairs and tables and people all around him when he felt it. A prickling on his cheek as though someone was looking at him, but as he glanced around the room, no one was obviously paying _him_ any sort of attention. The feeling didn’t go away like someone was not only watching him, but taking pride in the fact they hadn’t been spotted. It was the same feeling as all those times before, all those times that Harry had gotten just a little too hopeful that someone had taken an interest in him. He tried to ignore it, he did, tried to eat his sandwich and read his textbook, but it felt like it was burning a hole straight through his cheek. He looked up to his left and straightaway his eyes met Tom’s. For just a moment, the world seemed to melt away and it was just the two of them staring back at each other. Then Lestrange threw a pencil at Tom to get his attention, and whatever circle that had been created was broken. But even as Tom looked away, Harry could still feel his heart racing and his cheek burning.

By the time he’d finished eating, the others had already left, and it was probably for the best. After all, if they weren’t here, it gave him no excuse to do anything but go back to his last lecture and then finish that essay and absolutely not think about Tom. That was honestly what he was going to do. But then as he rounded the corner, he heard them.  
“…and Rosier, maybe you could actually arrive before midday tomorrow?” said Tom. Rosier audibly groaned, and Druella said something that Harry didn’t hear, but Tom didn’t deign to answer anyway, instead, he just continued, “be there for ten.”  
Someone else groaned, and Harry moved against the wall.  
“Really, Riddle? You know, some of us do actually sleep, right,” said Lestrange, or rather he whined it, like a toddler.  
“Oh, my heart bleeds for you, Lestrange, having to get out of bed at nine-thirty, the humanity.”  
“There’s no need to be so sarcastic.”  
“Then there’s no reason for you to be so deliberately subversive, is there?”  
Lestrange groaned again, “seriously though?”  
Tom sighed, like a parent whose child was being intentionally disobedient in front of everyone. “All those with a problem of being there by ten, please, raise their hands,” said Tom, though his tone had changed, this was no longer a matter of joviality or even of casualness, now it was entirely serious.  
“Oh dear, looks like you’re in a minority Lestrange, too bad. Be there for ten.”  
Though he couldn’t see, Harry suspected that Lestrange was glaring and had his arm folded, like he always did when he was annoyed.  
“Don’t be so childish, it’s just one day.”  
“We could go get lunch after,” said Rosier, “then go to the library?” finished Druella. Harry listened more intently, he’d promised he wouldn’t think about them, but that was only for today, not for tomorrow.  
“That’s fine by me,” said Tom, “is it fine by you, Lestrange?”  
It must have been because then a locker was rattling, and they were all talking about something else, and there was the shuffling of bags and they were walking away.  
Harry stayed still against the wall for a few more minutes, until he was sure they were. He was too hot, and his heart hurt for hammering so hard, but he knew he just had to be in the library. He just had to. If he arrived earlier enough and hid in his corner and forced himself to just listen to them, rather than watch, then they’d never been the wiser, and he could get another look of them and then, then he could leave them behind forever. Just one more look he promised himself.


	4. amicus curiae

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I honestly didn't mean for this chapter to be written now, but it's happened now and there's nothing I can do about it so I might as well post it. I'll also apologise for the somewhat dialogue and philosophy heavy nature of this chapter.

Harry got to the library considerably before them, considerably before anyone else at all actually. The librarian had politely smiled to him with her sleepy eyes as he walked passed at quarter past eight in the morning. Early enough that he’d watched the sun slink up until it was in line with the buildings. Early enough that the crispness of the day had not yet turned to cold, and the pretty pink strips of the sun were still turning the white stone buildings into towers of pink bubblegum that the classic’s students were always chewing.  
It was nice to cross the river when there was no one else around, somehow it felt safer not to have to deal with other people because Harry had never been good with people. They never seemed to do what he expected them to, and when they did do as expected, it was usually something bad. That was why he travelled through the streets when the sun had barely risen, and only the earliest shops were opening their doors.  
To walk alone also gave him a chance to breathe, a chance to think, and, today, to plan. He was going to spend the morning reading cases and completing that essay due next week. Then maybe he’d do some reading as he waited for them to arrive. Then, when they did, he’d watch. He’d indulge himself one last time, and then he’d go back to the mundane world that he was used to. It was the perfect plan. 

As usual, he went to their favourite room in the library. The one at the end of the twisting corridors, the one with the high west-facing window, the one with three small alcoves that he could hide in. Harry hoped that by lurking in the shadows they wouldn’t see him, and that, maybe if he kept quiet enough and didn’t do anything stupid, like he had done last time, then they wouldn’t notice at all, and he would be free to watch; free to get his next fix of them without being interrupted.  
But after two hours he regretted getting there quite so early. No one else at all was in this part of the library and the silence was overwhelming. So overwhelming that he found his eyes drawn to a mouse across the room, just scuttling along the skirting to a small hole in the floor and he wondered if there had always been mice here, and he had just never noticed. He could hear it even when it had disappeared, just a scratching beneath the floorboards, the sort of quiet sound that people dismissed when they weren’t alone. Were any of them scared of mice? Harry smiled to himself as he imagined Malfoy up on the table, and Tom rolling his eyes and Lestrange sweeping at the little creature with a broom. It would make quite a sight to know they were all afraid of something so small and innocent, and so much like himself. For Harry couldn’t help but make the comparisons, they were just so obvious. A mouse was quiet and small and easily forgotten, and so was he. No one remembered the brown mouse unless it caused a problem and then all hell broke loose, as they tried to trap it and catch it and kill it. So perhaps Harry identified a little too much with the mouse, but he couldn’t help it really, nature had just made him this way and now there was nothing he could do about it.  
None of them were like mice, they were all far too sophisticated, far too interesting to be mere mice. The six of them, perhaps with the exception of Avery, were more like the cats that were allowed to wander through the library. Harry had seen them, five in total, they were supposed to be professional mousers according to the signs on the door, but, really, he’d never seen them do anything other than sleep. Lying on the floors and the desks, always in a patch of sunlight, or, if there was no sun, beside a radiator or under one of the desk lamps that had been left on. They just lay there, looking ever so pretty and infinitely aware of their own charms. The five of them were definitely like cats. Pretty and preening, intelligent and cunning, perfectly happy to spend their days lying around being appreciated by other people, but at the same time predatory.  
Tom had the same look in his eyes when he gave that cruel-kind smile, as the cats did when they were in a hunting mood and could see a mouse on the other side of the room. Maybe, having compared himself to the mouse in that situation, Harry should have been scared, but how could he be when that smile was just so intoxicating?  
Even though Harry didn’t much like the cats, for he had seen enough of their claws, and the shredded curtains that had to be replaced before shorter ones had apparently been brought in, to know that they could be destructive, and whilst he’d never seen any evidence of it, Tom and his friends gave off the same impression. As though, when they smiled, they knew they were blinding, knew that people would come and gladly be dazzled by their money and glittery conversations. Like they were just playing a game, where they were cats and all the other people in the world were mice. Such a revelation would have made ordinary people turn their backs, walk away from such people, but it only made Harry want to stay for longer. Perhaps it was because he so readily accepted his place as a mouse, or maybe it was because he simply didn’t care as long as he got to be by their sides. Whatever it was, Harry didn’t bother to dwell on it. 

They were later arriving than Harry expected, and he had been in the library for eight hours by the time he heard the sound of several shoes coming at once on the wooden floors. He turned off the lamp that lit his alcove, which did nothing to dampen his feelings that what he was about to do probably did cross the line into inappropriate behaviour, not that that had stopped him yet.  
They were laughing as they came into the room, dumping their bags down on their usual table, like vultures claiming ownership of a carcass. Harry even heard the tell-tale sound of books being placed on the table top as well, but he suspected they were just for show, to pretend that they were doing work, not that anyone would try and move them off if they weren’t.  
As they came in, fingers gliding over the bookshelves and the table’s surface, Harry thought he saw Tom’s eyes dart over to his alcove, as if Tom was looking for someone in the darkness. But when rationality kicked in, he supposed that what he’d actually seen was just a trick of the light, the flash of the sun on Druella’s diamond ring, perhaps. 

Whether it was by habit or deliberate design, they returned to what was their usual configuration:, Tom at the end of the table closest to Harry and the window, then clockwise, Lestrange, Druella, Rosier and Avery, then on Tom’s right, Malfoy, sitting much closer to Tom than the others. Harry had already moved his chair back before they came in, so all he needed to do was sit back, keep close to the bookshelves and admire them. Admire Tom in particular. Though today he was sitting more straight on to the others and Harry couldn’t see his face. Not that he minded, he still got to the see the rest of him. He still got to see how he rested one arm, pseudo-casually, over the back of the chair, the other spread towards Malfoy. His nails drawing absent little circles on the wood, as the others got settled into their conversations. Tom was perfect. So casual, but without the usual carelessness that came with it. Harry just wanted to pass hours watching him, running the pads of his fingers along Tom’s forearm, just to feel if he was really human. 

Harry half-listened as they talked about nothing for a while, hushed voices that he couldn’t quite hear properly. He watched as Tom shifted, a little closer to Malfoy than usual, and continued to survey the conversation. Harry had to notice though, that there seemed to be one voice missing from the discussion, Avery’s. Although he was definitely in the room as Rosier had called him by name when they first walked it. No matter where the conversation strayed, Avery seemed to be hovering on the fringe of it, never quite invited into the fabric of the group, and it was at times like this when it was obvious that he was new, and still didn’t quite fit in.  
When there was a lull, after what seemed like a particularly dramatic statement concerning the hypocrisy of someone called Wittgenstein that Lestrange seemed to loath, Tom was the one to fill it.  
“Avery,” he said, and though Harry couldn’t see Avery, he imagined his head snapped up like one of those little dogs when their masters call.  
“I heard you’ve been sitting in on first years Ethics lectures, find anything interesting?”  
If Harry was not mistaken, and he honestly didn’t think he was, it did not sound like a subject that Tom was remotely interested in, more that he’d felt a need to reengage Avery, stop him drifting away. Perhaps stop the others ignoring him.  
“I like Kant,” came the quiet reply a few seconds later, one that it sounded to Harry that Avery had put a lot of effort into forcing his tongue to say.  
Druella snorted, “really?” she said, leaning forward, elbows on the table, “you like Kant? Why?”  
Avery audibly swallowed, “you know, he seems to have good ideas.”  
“Which bit? The categorical imperative? His ideas on the good will? Oh, Avery aren’t you just adorable?”  
“What’s wrong with it? And it’s not like you’re any better, you’re a goddamn hedonist,” he said, a new edge curling into his voice, something scrappy and irritable, like a small dog, with more bark than bite.  
“Oh, don’t use that sort of language, Avery,” continued Druella, calm and cool as ever, “and you say Hedonist like I’m supposed to be offended.”  
“You are. It’s disgusting.”  
Harry could almost hear someone rolling their eyes, probably more than one person, but Druella spoke again, now with a sharper edge to her own tone, one that sounded mildly condescending. “I think you mistake the meaning of pleasure as something inherently sinful, Avery, as defined, perhaps, by a religious code.”  
“He associates it with carnality and indulgence,” said Rosier, suddenly contributing after an unusual amount of silence, “it’s a rather crude and literal interpretation of pleasure.” Rosier shifted, the chair skidding over the floor, “but pleasure doesn’t have to be like that.”  
“How?”  
“Well,” said Druella, “if being a virtuous person is what will bring me the most pleasure, a higher sort of pleasure if you will, then I am none of the ‘disgusting’ things that you implied me to be.”  
“What?” said Avery, continuing to sound several steps behind. Though Harry himself really had no right to judge.  
“Some pleasures are more valuable than others,” Druella said, and Harry could just see as she sat back in her chair looking pleased with herself.  
“To put it in words that perhaps you’ll understand,” said Rosier, “some pleasures are temporary, short-lived little things that really mean nothing in the long term; these are hollow pleasures or lower pleasures. Others are far more valuable as they will increase the overall pleasure that we feel in society, really this was covered in the first hour,” he continued, also leaning back with the confidence of someone who knows they’re right.

“You know, you’re being awfully cruel, Rosier,” said Tom, apparently interrupting before it became an argument, always playing the peacekeeper. Though on this occasion, Tom’s tone did not suggest that he was admonishing Rosier at all, rather that he found such teasing amusing.  
“Am I?”  
“Yes, you’re picking on someone who’s only trying to better themselves, if you want a real debate on the merits of your ideology, surely you should speak to one of us who actually studies it?”  
“Ah yes, how wonderful,” said Rosier, leaning forward again, the tips of his fingers coming into view. “Another Hedonist, a Relativist, an Egoist and a Utilitarian, what is there to discuss Riddle, other than you’re all wrong?”  
Harry was sure Tom smiled. “Well for starters there’s _why_ we’re wrong, or rather, why _you’re_ wrong given that Hedonism is terribly outdated these days.”  
“Hardly, it’ll be the apocalypse before you can no longer divide people into being a Hedonist or an Ascetic.”  
“Really?” said Lestrange having managed to stay quiet for a good five minutes, which to Harry seemed like a record.  
“Yes, watch.”  
Harry could just about see the tips of Rosier’s fingers as he pointed to Druella, “hedonist,” he said, the fingers moved to point at Lestrange, “hedonist,” he said again. He pointed at Malfoy, “hedonist, see easy.”  
“I can’t help but notice that you skipped Riddle,” said Malfoy, his own fingers still tapping closer to Tom’s than usual.  
“Yes,” said Tom, “if everyone can be divided, what am I?”  
Rosier was probably smirking given his tone. “It’s my theory, so the rest of you have to work it out yourselves,” he said smugly  
“Hey, that’s not how it works,” interrupted Lestrange, “you have to at least tell us – ”  
“No, no, Lestrange. This could be fun,” said Malfoy, looking right at Tom and lightly chewing his lip in a way that made Harry’s tongue stick in his mouth and that tightness in his chest to return. It was outrageously pretty in a way that was entirely wrong, and yet just looked so good.  
“What would you say I am, then Abraxas?” said Tom, no longer paying the others even the most superficial attention. Harry had a perfect view of the way they looked at each other, like none of the others was even there.  
“Well, I think it’s quite obvious, Tom.”  
“And yet you’re unwilling to answer me?”  
Malfoy smiled, and leaned even closer to Tom, from this angle, and this angle alone, Harry could see how Malfoy’s fingers pressed into Tom’s thigh, and just how close his tongue was to Tom’s neck.  
“It’s not that I’m _unwilling_ ,” he practically purred, “I just don’t want to take away the opportunity from someone who’s just _dying_ to talk to you.”  
Harry suddenly felt cold, like someone had poured ice down the back of his shirt. He looked down, picking up his pen and staring at the paper, knowing full well he was the only other person in the room. But maybe he was wrong? Maybe he’d missed someone? Or perhaps Malfoy meant Avery? Maybe? Hopefully?  
They weren’t talking about anyone else. That was painfully obvious when a silence fell over the entire room and Harry felt the heaviness of six pairs of eyes digging into his head, and just like before he could feel that embarrassing blush spilling all over his face like spilt ink. He should make a run for it, leave like last time and pretend that nothing had happened. That was what he should do, but he was just stuck to the spot like a fear-frozen mouse as the cat slowly approached.  
“Potter, isn’t it? Harry Potter?” said Tom, his voice cool and crisp across the room.  
“Yes,” he choked out, still not daring to look up.  
“Care to come over here? Or are you going to run away from us again?”

If there was ever something that Harry cared not to do, this was it. Just one of them was bad enough, but having to face all six of them, and with the obvious stain of shame all over his face was far more than he was prepared to handle.  
“We don’t bite, you know,” said Tom, in a way that definitely suggested that Tom was ready to eat him alive. Harry silently cursed himself for getting caught even as he felt his legs moving, then his torso and finally his head. Walking over to them but making no effort at all to look, because if he did that, well, he might never look away.  
“Would you mind if I asked you a question, Harry? If I may call you Harry?”  
Harry nodded, he wasn’t sure what to, probably everything.  
“Thank you. Were you listening in to our conversations again, Harry?”  
“No,” he said, though he would be honestly surprised if anyone heard him. His brain was turning quickly to wool and what words did manage to escape were cottony and quiet. He knew he sounded slightly pathetic, that much was obvious.  
“Well I’m glad to hear that you have some boundaries,” Tom said, with what Harry suspected was a smile, “but that, of course, means you won’t know what we were talking about, correct?” Tom asked, like he was trying to catch him out.  
Harry shook his head, so sure that Tom could see right through him, could see that his lie was as transparent as a pane of glass.  
Looking through the straggled ends of his fringe, Harry could see the razor-sharp edges of Tom’s smile.  
“That’s really a shame,” Tom said, that mouth curling around the words, “because we were talking about me, and I think you’re quite interested in me, aren’t you Harry?”  
Harry shrugged.  
“This is going to be a terribly dull conversation if you’re only going to pay attention to the floor.” Although Tom didn’t say anything, the command, and somehow also the threat was very clear. Harry was going to have to look up. He counted it down in his head, _three, two, one_. He looked up. Tom was smiling. “Thank you, though I’d hope you knew that it is common courtesy for people to look at each other when they’re talking.”  
Harry found himself nodding again, really too overwhelmed with feelings for Tom’s eyes to do anything else. A small part of him hated himself because he had always scoffed at those romance novels that his aunt read, where the love interest’s eyes were given so many impractical and frankly unrealistic metaphorical comparisons, and yet, as he stared at Tom he had to wonder whether every Romance author had taken inspiration from his face. There was just something indescribably gorgeous about it, an almost painful sort of beauty that was only evident this close up, the sort that people would probably die for, maybe even kill for.  
He was pulled from his musing by another of Tom’s question. “You’re on straight law aren’t you, Harry?”  
He nodded, wishing that he could get a word out but still failing to.  
“Do you know anything about philosophy?”  
Harry nodded again, knowing that he’d definitely done it too many times now, they were probably thinking he was usually a mute.  
“Can he actually talk?” said Lestrange suddenly and conveniently.  
“Of course, he can talk, you idiot,” Tom said briefly breaking eye contact to glare at Lestrange. “Quite eloquently I imagine, when you want to, isn’t that right Harry?”  
“Yes,” he choked out.  
“Will you talk to me if Lestrange promises to keep his mouth shut?”  
“Yes,” Harry said again, the words finally starting to flow properly, as though the temporary blockage had been dislodged.  
“You heard that Lestrange, don’t interrupt.”

“So, tell me, Harry, as you know about philosophy, do you know what an Ascetic and a Hedonist are?”  
“I think so,” he said, if just for more diversity than repeating ‘yes.’ And it was partially true, Harry had heard the word before, and he was pretty sure he could fake his way out of any basic question Tom was about to ask, and, well, by this point he was prepared to lie if it meant he could keep talking to Tom, keep being close enough to figuratively drown in his eyes.  
“Are you sure?”  
Harry repeated his answer, and he was sure Tom recognised that he really didn’t have a clue what he was talking about.  
“Well congratulations, but would you mind if I clarify, for the sake, at least, of Avery over there, who is not so well versed in philosophical ideas?”  
“Sure.”  
To give him credit, Tom kept up the pretence that it was all for Avery very well, he talked directly to him, and Avery seemed the glow in the attention.  
“Hedonism is, of course, the infamous philosophical doctrine that prioritises the pursuit of pleasure, and not only the pursuit. An act can only be considered morally good for us, if that act is pleasurable, likewise an act may only be considered bad for us when it results in pain. Understand?”  
Avery nodded, wide eyes never leaving Tom’s.  
“Good. Asceticism is perhaps the flip-side of that coin, though I’m sure at least one Rosier, if not both, would criticise that statement,” he said, his gaze already passing over to them. Rosier certainly looked ready to criticise it, but he seemed to realise that this was not the time; though such a realisation was probably better attributed to Druella digging her elbow into his ribs before he could interrupt. Tom smiled at her and continued, “Asceticism is where one lives abstaining from sensual pleasures. It requires considerable self-discipline, and is typically practised for spiritual reasons, and _can_ be linked to the ancient philosophical doctrine of Stoicism, which I will not get into now, though if you are interested, I’m sure we could talk about it later.”  
Harry didn’t care that the statement wasn’t addressed to him, nor that he was not remotely interested in Stoicism, if he got to hear Tom talk about it, listen to that gorgeously slow and measured way that he spoke, then he would be interested in anything and everything that Tom wanted to talk about. 

Tom somehow managed to drag his eyes off of the others and turned back to Harry. “So, Harry, returning to our conversation, that perhaps, as you are so fond of listening in, you would like to join.” He didn’t give Harry a chance to interject before continuing. “Care to answer this Harry, am I more of an Ascetic or more of a Hedonist?”  
Harry swallowed, trying to be as calm as Tom was. “Well, you’re not an ascetic,” he said, a little too proud that he got through the first sentence without stuttering. “You indulge yourself in other people too much.”  
He honestly wasn’t sure where that accusation was coming from, and apparently, neither was Tom, based on the curiosity that briefly fluttered across his features. Fortunately, a thought came to Harry, before he started to mumble about nothing. That simple lovely image of Tom and Druella on the stairs, Druella with her clever words, and Tom looking like he wanted to eat them. But Tom interrupted his thoughts before he could share them.  
“I _indulge_ myself, do I? What a lovely way of putting it, care to elaborate?” he said with a combination of interest and boredom that only he was able to pull off so exquisitely. Leaning back in his chair, head to the side, looking both disinterested in the answer, but engaged in the method of reaching it.  
“Well – well, you feed off other people’s minds,” Harry continued, slightly more confident now. “You consume them, intellectually; strip them of their knowledge right down to the bone. ”  
“You make me sound _cannibalistic_ , Harry.”  
The way Tom said such an abominable thing was hypnotic, chewing on the word, spreading it all over his tongue before he let it roll out his mouth. So much so that it became accusatory in words only. The tone Tom paired it with was far more satisfied, bordering almost on seductive, as though it entertained him to know _that_ was what someone thought of him.  
“Is that your only reasoning?” he said, his tongue catching on the final word and making prickle run down Harry’s spine.  
“No,” he said, knowing perfectly well it was. His brain felt sluggish and useless as he stood there for just a tad too long, getting hotter and more uncomfortable as the twelve unceasing eyes continued to watch him.  
“Umm – You’re not religious, are you?” he said eventually, knowing it was grasping at straws. Fortunately, though Tom shook his head.  
“Well, you need devotion to be ascetic, and you have to have religion to have devotion, and… you’re not religious, so you have no devotion, and so no reason to be ascetic,” said Harry the words just falling out his mouth in a long, and hoped, coherent stream.  
“Interesting,” Tom said, turning his attention away from Harry and instead to his own fingers as they slid over the table before settling, only inch or two from Malfoy’s hand.  
“Assuming your argument is valid, why then, am I not a hedonist?”  
Harry swallowed again, all of them, apart from Tom, were still watching him, and he hot and awkward and it made his palms damp. He rubbed them inelegantly on his trousers. Wishing that they’d all look away and that only Tom would look at him.  
“Because pleasure means nothing to you either,” he said eventually.  
Tom turned to face him; a look Harry would like to interpret as genuine intrigue nestled between his usual coolness.  
“Go on.”  
“You – you,” Harry stumbled, Tom was watching him now, really watching him. It was the same way that he had been looking at him in the cafeteria, dark and hungry to intellectually take him apart piece by piece, and just prove Harry right.  
Harry swallowed, trying to get his words out. “You don’t desire pleasure, nor do you seek to obtain it. It’s just something you…” Harry wasn’t entirely sure where he was going. But like before the memory, brief and fleeting of something Harry had seen as he’d walked to his tutorial on the seventh floor. The sight of someone he’d thought was Tom, standing on the stairway, smiling and offering quiet pleasantries in return for a polite favour.  
“Pleasure is just something you use to get what you want,” Harry found himself saying. 

Tom was silent for just long enough to make Harry nervous. Just long enough that he was starting to shuffle from foot to foot and wondering whether he could make it to the door and then never ever come back here again. Whether he would be able to avoid them like the plague, perhaps transfer to some distant university in Scotland and never have to look at their perfect faces ever again. Never having to face Tom again. He could, he definitely could, all it would take was –  
“I must say,” Tom began, interrupting his migration plans, “I am curious to know how you know all that about me. In fact, I would be tempted to say that you’re a stalker Harry, one with an – unhealthy level of interest in me.”  
“I’m not,” he said, perhaps a little too quickly.  
“Well that aside then, your reasoning was frankly amateurish, and much of it not remotely philosophical, rather I would say psychological; not to mention that I disagree with a lot of it.”  
Harry swallowed; his throat too tight, everything too tight, like he strung up ready to endure public humiliation.  
“But I like your ideas, I like what you see.” Tom licked his lip in a way that Harry thought was entirely inappropriate, “I like how intimately you dissect me,” said Tom smiling, “and I am somewhat intrigued to know what you’d think of me, if you really knew who I was.”  
There was a sinister edge to Tom’s voice that made him a little uncomfortable, but it was overridden by the intensity of his eyes, the slow steady pace of his words. His simply overwhelming perfection. 

“Could you answer me one more question, Harry?”  
Harry nodded, not trusting his voice to stay steady.  
“Why _are_ you reading law? When you sound as though you’d be a lot more at home in psychology, perhaps?”  
“I want to make a difference,” he said, his eyes returning to the swirling patterns on the wooden floor.  
“Surely you could do that in any other degree, rather than subject yourself to such demands as the law requires,” said Tom, in a statement that Harry found vaguely offensive, but he wasn’t sure why.  
“Are you saying I’m stupid.”  
“Of course not,” said Tom in a way that faintly suggested he had been. Tom must have seen that he wasn’t convinced, “how about then, that you prove to me that you’re not.”  
“What?” said Harry, finding himself in rather the same position Avery had been, and suddenly having a lot more sympathy for him.  
“I’d like it if you’d sit with us tomorrow, would you like that?”  
Harry nodded with probably too much enthusiasm.  
“Excellent, we’ll see you tomorrow then, Harry,” said Tom in a way that seemed to dismiss him, like a schoolmaster dismissing an unruly pupil.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope this wasn't too bad, please forgive any philosophical mistakes, I don't think there were any glaringly obvious ones, but feel free to point to out any if you see them.


	5. in arguendo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for my rather long absence, here's an extra long chapter to make up for it.

The window in the kitchen was banging loudly in the wind. Harry could hear it even from his room, a repetitive knocking like the slam of the door. Someone hadn’t put it on the latch when they’d last been in. He _could_ deal with it, and he probably should, but that would mean getting up and starting the day, and _that_ would mean having to meet _them_.  
Harry shut his eyes and listened to the banging of the window, though now, it had become more annoying and less sleep-inducing. He’d been half-awake for hours now, just lying and waiting, knowing he’d have to move soon, no matter how much he was regretting everything.  
He’d never been invited to meet anyone before, he was not the type to be invited to places, particularly not by beautiful, intelligent, wealthy people who were obviously so much better than he was. Where he had awkwardness, they had sophistication, he’d seen it, he’d spent far too long seeing it, so this was probably his comeuppance really. His punishment for looking at the things that weren’t his to look at. Harry knew as he was staring up at the blank ceiling, that he should have just stopped looking when the going was good, he’d seen plenty already, but he _had_ to go ahead and ruin it by getting one more look, and now he was in this mess. 

He spent too long in the kitchen, opening cupboards much too slow, pouring his cereal even slower, standing with the fridge door open for much too long as he stared at the last bottle of milk he had left, before just shutting the door and sitting at the table with dry cereal, and the window still banging.  
It was cold in the kitchen, cold and unpleasant, but at least it wasn’t with them, at least here he could sit by himself. Here, he didn’t have to worry about what they were all thinking, what they would say to each other as soon as he was gone. He didn’t have to think of Tom, of the way he smiled, of the way he talked, the way he was so perfect in everything he did, but still had something hidden under his skin. Harry was sure he’d seen flickers of it in Tom’s smiles, in the way that he turned his head and the way that all the others, supported but never contradicted the things he said. Tom was simply special, and Harry wanted to be close enough that, maybe, some of that specialness would transfer to him. Maybe, if he was with them, he’d feel less – less of every negative thing he felt.  
But at the same time, he couldn’t shake the feeling of inadequacy that had embedded itself so deep in his bones. He was the mouse to their cats, the amateur to their prodigy, he was simply nothing to their everything, and why would they really want to have him around? He thought about it as he went to wash up his bowl, but as he reached the sink, the cheap porcelain slipped from his hand and into the sink, clattering and breaking into at least ten pieces too many to glue back together. It was the perfect ending to a terrible morning. 

As Harry walked towards the library, because he couldn’t sit in his silent room any longer, he knew he was dragging his heels. Taking much too much time to do anything, including spending far too long staring at the hazing view across the bridge; the sun invisible behind a wall of cloud. All he could see was the outline of a golden circle faintly glimmering. There was no one out on the bridge today, perhaps they could sense the rain coming, that or they all had conspired against him to increase his apocalyptic sense of unease. Either way, it was not a comfort.  
Harry shamefully took the longest route he needed, he turned the wrong way deliberately, down side-streets that led nowhere in the hope that maybe he would get permanently lost in London’s maze, and then he’d have a lovely excuse for never turning up at all. He felt like one of those intelligent mice used in the experiments the biology students talked about over lunch. The ones where the mouse was released through a maze, and if it found the way, it was rewarded, and if it did not, then punishment awaited it. He wondered whether meeting Tom again constituted as a reward or a punishment.  
He did briefly consider not turning up at all. But then again, he thought, stopping on a corner beneath a flower basket where all the flowers were dead; if he never turned up, he’d never get to see Tom’s face, nor would he get to hear their witty conversations that gave him the only joy in his life. Their lives had slowly become the reason for his own, and to deny himself them, was to deny himself of everything he knew he craved. Their perfection was stupefying, painfully so, and everyone said that they rarely spoke to anyone else, at least nothing more than the appropriate small talk to people of their own social strata. So this really was his only opportunity.

He’d spent too long in his head. Harry knew that because as he looked around, he didn’t recognise anything. The buildings were not the usual ones he passed, they were not places of business, but rather, places of residence. Somehow, he’d stumbled into the residential quarter, the upper-class one at that. Large white houses, with tall windows and black rail fences. The sort that had twisted columns standing proud at their entrances, the sort that had flowers and grass and an overwhelming freshness that could only be achieved with money.  
In a strange way, they reminded Harry of them; of their tall pristine appearances, always elegant, always polished. Compared to them, he was just the paperboy’s shabby bicycle that rested against the fence at the far end. He couldn’t see the paperboy, and it was just him standing and staring and subconsciously dreaming of the tall white houses.  
They all had numbers, brass numbers right in the centre of black doors. He was standing in front of number one, and though the street was long and punctuated by trees with dying leaves he supposed there must be about twelve or so houses on each side.  
He could have stayed there too long just watching the houses, waiting to see the sorts of people that lived in them, but that was a step too far even for his level of procrastination, so he turned around and walked back the way he came, trying to forget those houses that should have meant nothing, but seemed to symbolise so much. 

Harry shivered, he couldn’t help but be nervous, this was the most nerve-wracking thing he’d ever done. There was something so finite, so deliberate about this offer. It held unspoken conditions such as, if he failed to be as interesting as Tom thought he was, then he would lose this opportunity and everything that went with it.  
He had been standing outside the library for nearly an hour now, always deliberating, telling himself he’d go in when the clock struck the quarter of the hour, but every time it did, he thought of something else he needed to do, and then he’d sit a little longer on the cold stone bench, his feet tapping against the cobbles in nervous agitation.  
Since the previous day, the weather had altered, and now it was much too cold. There was also a thick spread of clouds all over the sky, dark charcoal clouds that threatened to spill everywhere at the slightest provocation. Harry kept glancing up at them, hoping for rain, hoping to get absolutely soaked and therefore having an excuse for turning up so horrendously late, or perhaps not turning up at all.  
But for all his deliberation, he didn’t leave. Instead, he sat in limbo, his heart beating twice-pace and a tremor that was nothing to do with the cold affecting his hand. Although it might just have been a brewing storm, there was a buzz in the air, a mild static like something was going to happen. Perhaps he read too much, had too many impossible dreams, but there almost felt like there was magic in the clouds and that it would infuse into him if he sat out here long enough.  
He was too romantic. The buzz was just the clouds, he knew because it started to rain. Just a faint smattering began to fall from the sky at first. Small droplets that became larger as the minutes passed until they were immense heavy things that splashed when they hit the ground. Harry stared up at the sky, feeling the cold water run down his face, perhaps taming his hair made wild by the wind, or perhaps merely sealing its fate as an unruly mess. He could hope for magic all he liked, but all he’d ever get was reality.  
When his face was half frozen and he could no longer feel his fingers, he went inside, no matter how much he didn’t want to.

The library’s heating had evidently been on since the early morning, as stepping inside resembled wandering into a freshly stoked kitchen fire. The cloying heat close enough that it was practically suffocating like he had been pushed headfirst into a steaming pan of syrup and was now swallowing it in hope of oxygen. None could be found.  
Everyone he passed, through the cavernous rooms that constituted the underbelly of this library, stared at him, and then glanced at the window, apparently only just realising that there existed a world outside of their little bubble.  
Least the heat, however soul-sucking, allowed him to dry quicker, or at least, superficially dry. Underneath he was still soaked, walking in damp clothes and even damper skin, not that it was anyone’s fault but his own.  
Harry deliberated again, when he finally reached the door they always kept shut, trying to stop other people interrupting them, and lowering their perfect average. Though he couldn’t hear anything that anyone was saying, there was the noise of muffled conversation through the door. He could still leave. He didn’t. In a moment of bravery that he would probably never be able to replicate, he opened the door. 

Inside, all of them were seated, all apart from Lestrange who appeared to be absent. They were all in their usual places too, except for Avery who’d moved closer to Malfoy. All of them were doing something to entertain themselves: Rosier and Druella were sharing a book, Avery was leaning back with his eyes closed, tipping his chair back dangerously far, and Tom and Malfoy were talking quietly. Harry briefly wondered who he heard talking, but he could think on it for long because they all looked over, and most of them smiled. Actually, it was only Avery who didn’t.  
“Harry,” said Tom, sitting back from Malfoy, “it had been so long, we didn’t think you were going to make an appearance.”  
“Sorry,” he said awkwardly, still holding the door handle, “it was – err – the rain,” he said trying to justify himself despite knowing they all knew his lateness had nothing to do with the weather.  
“He means we thought you’d chickened out,” said Druella, her chin perfectly balanced on the back of her hand.  
He flushed. “As – as I said – umm – the rain.”  
“Yes, horrendous, isn’t it?” Druella continued, indulging his lie for a while longer, and out of politeness, they all turned to the open window at the other end of the room.  
Without conversation, the rain was loud as it bounced on the roof and smacked hard against the glass. There was a patch of wooden floor that looked decidedly damp stretching at least three feet from the window. But it did cool the room, removing the stickiness of the heat and replacing it with a far fresher feeling that actually allowed Harry to breathe.  
It was then that he realised he was the only one still staring at the window. The others had all turned back to face him and were now watching with a mixture of intrigue, politeness and disdain, though the latter sentiment was mostly coming from Avery.  
“Do take a seat,” said Tom never taking his eyes off him.  
“Where?” he said self-consciously, there were a couple of spare seats: one beside Malfoy, the one where Lestrange usually sat, and the one next to Rosier that Avery usually sat in.  
“Next to me,” said Rosier, pulling it out. He smiled as Harry approached in a way that was far more genuine than any of the others. “I’m the nice one,” he said continuing to smile.  
The others all rolled their eyes and let out a collective sigh.  
“You’re a crawler, Rosier, and you know it,” said Malfoy.  
“Gets me what I want though, doesn’t it?” he replied, Malfoy sighed again, but didn’t pursue the point.  
“Take whichever one you want, Harry, no one will be offended, will they?”  
Everyone shook their head innocently. Though, for ease, Harry took the one beside Rosier. 

“So, Harry,” said Tom, leaning forward just a little and paying him more attention than he usually received in an entire week, “what is the law to you?”  
That was not a question he was expecting, and Harry stumbled, apparently Tom was not one for small talk.  
“Riddle, you shouldn’t jump straight in like that,” said Rosier, “it’s a bit too brutal.”  
“He can take it, can’t you, Harry?”  
Harry found himself nodding, despite knowing already that he was entirely out of his depth. Tom continued to look at him, evidently, still waiting for an answer.  
“Umm – well – I suppose the law is – umm – the rules?”  
Tom smiled, not quite unkindly, but with the same mocking amusement as the day before, “no,” he said, lounging back in such a way that harry found it indecent to keep watching, and instead studied the wood of the table again.  
“Rather, Harry,” he continued, those nice fingers tapping against the wood of the table, “rather, I want to know what the law _means_ to you. Is it freedom or control? Passion or reason? Deception or truth?”  
Harry found himself chewing on his lip like a schoolboy before he could stop himself, trying to think of an answer. He wasn’t good at spontaneous questioning, it was why he was so bad in lectures, and tutorials and meeting and everything else.  
“Umm – Well I suppose it’s freedom and… reason and… truth?”  
“Was that a statement or a question?” Tom said, turning his head to the side and reminding Harry, intentionally or not, of the particularly insistent lecturers. The ones that demanded opinions, and hooked them from your every mouth if they had to, before smiling and dissecting it with immense pleasure in front of everyone. Tom looked like that, except with a little more warmth around the corners of his mouth.  
“Umm – A statement.”  
“Care to justify it?”  
Harry was tempted to refuse, but Tom’s gaze was intent, and he didn’t want to refuse it, he just didn’t want to be told he was entirely wrong, like last time. “Umm – ”  
“And would it be possible not to start every sentence with umm?”  
Harry flushed, “oh, um– sorry.”  
He stopped and took a breath, trying to focus on the blurred words that sat inside dormant inside his head, if he’d realised thinking would be involved, then he would have spent a little longer sitting in the kitchen listening to the banging of the window.  
“I – Well, the – the law is based on freedom, and built on reason, and enacted in truth,” he said, his fingers twisting awkwardly at the hem of his shirt. They were too hot, even in the cool, and were just sticky and uncomfortable. Harry knew he looked the complete opposite of the rest of them.  
“That’s hardly a justification, but still, do you _really_ believe that those qualities are true?” said Tom, fingers no longer tapping, in fact, he was no longer moving at all, just leaning back, perfectly still, the height of sophistication. 

“Do tell me, Harry,” he said, making no attempt to move, “how are we free when we have laws that dictate what we may do? They restrict us, constrain us and assume that we are incapable of knowing right from wrong intuitively. They feel the need to educate us, whilst giving us no education. The law is simply the greatest form of control that we will ever know.”  
Harry sat still, blinking at him like a dumb thing. There was surely some truth in Tom’s statement, or he would not have said it, but at the same time, there felt something truly _wrong_ in the words; something rare and improperly explored in how he flouted the very basis of society. It should not have been as intriguing as it was, and Tom seemed to see his interest because he continued.  
“How too is the law built on reason when, the very nature of law is so vague and indistinct, that there is an entire class of people dedicated to deciphering its intent? It is a passionate thing that people will fight to the death to create for themselves, and each and every one of us, dreams of being an omniscient lawmaker, do we not? And if our passions control us, then we as lawmakers must infuse the law with such passion.”  
The words slid from Tom’s mouth and surrounded Harry, practically visible before his eyes, heavy and important and deeply meaningful, even if he couldn’t understand why. Tom continued to smile, and it felt like the others were melting away, and it was just him and Tom sitting across the table staring and talking, like they were friends, even though they weren’t.  
“And Harry,” Tom said, so much quieter and more intimate than before, “how is law truthful when the very fabric of our existence is stitched together with lies? I do not know how truthful you are, nor you, me; we build ourselves on deception, usually for our own gain; we lie, and we cheat, and we manipulate. And if the system is built by us, and we are dishonest, then how can the law ever be the truth? It is merely formalised perspective, and one that is limited to a narrow, ungainly, view of life.”  
Harry swallowed, unsure what he was supposed to say in return, how he could compete with such articulacy. It sounded like Tom had been waited forever to have this conversation, and he would be disappointed when one half of it was missing. Fortunately though, Tom took it upon himself to answer for him, “would you agree with that assessment?”  
“No,” Harry said instinctively, before pausing and reconsidering. For just a second that flicker that he had glimpsed yesterday was once again curling across Tom’s face, a strange mixture of intrigue and conspiracy, as though he was deliberately leading Harry astray, in hope of making him arrive at a conclusion that matched his own. 

“I think you’re wrong,” Harry said slowly, his heart beating like a wild bird against a cage. Just like yesterday, he had no real idea where he was going, and he sort of hoped that his brain was willing to engage, or it would all just be a mess, and an embarrassing one at that.  
“The law respects the rights of individuals, doesn’t it? It gives us considerable liberty to do as we wish, and what it prohibits us from doing is what morals would disincline us from anyway. You might be passionate in your life, and so might I, but the law is, universally, reason _free_ from passion. There are not lawyers or judges or scholars that warp the law with passion, they are merely passionate for the law. And, the – the law is not deception. Perhaps, Tom…” He stopped, trying to decide if he’d imagined the way Tom flinched at his name. Tom only continued to watch him unmoving but intrigued all the same.  
“A–as I was saying, perhaps you are a deceptive person, perhaps _you_ thrive on lying and – and cheating and manipulating, but that doesn’t alter the fact that our laws are above us. They are greater than what we are. And as such our own imperfections cannot be spread to them… you know?” The words all came out in a rush, without a pause for thought or breath. They were dreadful sentences, but Tom smiled at him anyway, a genuine smile, like he had been waiting for this exact moment for a while now.  
“That was awfully zealous, you would almost think I hit a nerve, did I, Harry?” he said with an almost childlike glee.  
Harry stayed silent, and that only made Tom’s smile stretch further.  
“I think I did,” he said slowly and carefully, like a dangerous plant slowly unfurling the petals that would act as bait to draw in unlikely prey.  
“And I think I understand now, why you insist on reading the law.”  
Harry suddenly looked down again, staring at the wood of the table, he didn’t want to hear it, but at the same time he was curious as to what Tom thought he knew about him, “and why’s that?” he murmured.  
“Life has unkind to you, hasn’t it, Harry? And the law could not be wielded; it lay unenforced by corruption or carelessness. You do not want other people to be in your position, that’s how you want to help them, isn’t it? By being there when no one was there for you.”  
Silence did not look like it would satisfy the situation, however appropriate, it might have been, and so he nodded. “Perhaps,” he said, raising his eyes to Tom’s and hoping that it looked more determined than the fuzziness of self that he felt inside, cold and exposed like curtains covering an open window. He hoped that Tom could not see that he was right because then he might find Harry boring.  
“How coy,” said Tom, holding his eyes for at least five seconds too many before turning to the others, “though it is a shame that Lestrange is not with us to witness your eloquence, as he was the one to doubt it. But nonetheless, for all your linguist elegance, Harry, you _are_ wrong, and perhaps you will come to see that if you stay with us for a while.” Tom turned back to him. “What the law what intended to be, and what it has become, are quite different things, somewhere along its tributary is has been poisoned, and now, what we consume so readily is not what we should be.”  
“You’re– ”  
Before Harry could finish, the door opened and Lestrange stalked into the room slamming the door hard behind him and making the books on the shelves nearby shake. 

He didn’t look at any of them before speaking. “If I have to so much as look at Alphard one more time this week, I swear I’ll fucking kill him,” snapped Lestrange, without so much as a hello first. They all looked at him, but no one said anything, perhaps Lestrange recognised the silence because he made a face that Harry didn’t know him well enough to interpret.  
“Well good afternoon to you too,” said Tom, the sound of his voice seemed louder when it was interrupting the intense silence. “It’s a pleasure that you could finally bless us with your company,” he continued, though his tone suggested it was anything but a pleasure, and Lestrange should know that.  
“Now the pleasantries are out the way, do you care to, at least, give the semblance of civility, given that we have a guest?”  
Lestrange rolled his eyes and sighed and made a half-hearted sneer in Harry’s direction, “so fucking sorry for interrupting you,” he spat, reaching his usual chair beside Tom and slumping down into it.  
When Harry turned his eyes back towards Tom, he swallowed. What warmth had been left in Tom’s gaze had drained away, and now his eyes were now cold and empty and deeply unsettling.  
The others seemed to realise, all of them averting their eyes to stare at the books and the ceiling and the floor and anywhere other than Tom and Lestrange. Even Malfoy managed to divert his stare from Tom’s face to the spine of a book in the centre of the table, his eyes flicking back across the title repeatedly. Only Harry looked.  
“Must we have another conversation about etiquette, Lestrange?” said Tom, dangerously quietly, his fingers tapping against the table again, loud in the silence. Harry swallowed again, there was something different in Tom’s face now, something much darker than before, much more unnerving. Harry glanced between the two of them, Tom somehow maintaining a superficial detachment that certainly wasn’t as indifferent as he wanted to appear, and Lestrange openly seething, his jaw clenching, teeth practically grinding audibly together. For a moment Harry thought that an argument might erupt, like the first time he’s watched them, but once again, after a minute or so, Lestrange dropped his gaze.  
“No. I apologise; it was an – inappropriate apology,” he said, still looking at the table.  
Tom seemed to smirk, “and what do you say to our guest?”  
Lestrange flicked his eyes momentarily at Tom, and when he got no reaction, he turned them towards Harry. “I sincerely apologise for the interruption,” he said with an expression that just teetered on a glare but never quite spilled over. Then his gaze was back on the wood, tracing the grooves with his eyes, and hoping that the others wouldn’t look. They didn’t. Whatever it was that they had just witnessed, they had all seen it before. 

All the way through the exchange, Malfoy had been leaning back in his chair, smirking a little too much, now he leaned forward. “What did Black do anyway?” he said, apparently trying to restart the conversation. His fingers also returned to Tom’s arm, still trailing lightly back and forth. Tom didn’t tell him to stop. And although Malfoy seemed to be playing the mediator between the two of them, he definitely looked like he was enjoying the disagreement far too much.  
Before Lestrange could answer, Rosier leaned over to Harry.  
“I suppose you don’t know Alphard Black, do you?” he said quietly.  
Harry shook his head, deciding it was probably better than lying.  
“Well, all you need to know is that he’s reading Politics and Economics, and Lestrange absolutely loathes him.”  
Harry nodded, though he probably could have guessed. The Blacks were another of those families that he’d heard of because _everyone_ had heard of them, they were, according to the dotted conversations Harry had ‘accidentally’ overheard, rich, but not special; not like these six. They didn’t possess any particular beauty, nor any superior intelligence. Their entire merits came from their name and their money, neither of which apparently impressed anyone in the group.  
“He – ” Lestrange paused looking for a word that described it correctly, “he – insulted me,” he said eventually, eyes still focussed too hard on the table.  
Tom laughed, “oh, poor you, will your ego survive, Lestrange?” he said, his tone crossing the delicate line into mocking. It should have been awful to hear, but Harry couldn’t help but swallow and lean a little closer, fingers edging over the wood in a way that caught Malfoy’s eye. But he didn’t care, Harry just wanted to hear every word, wanted, shamelessly, to be able to play it back over and over again in his head.  
He needed to lie on the edge of sleep and hear those words, that sardonic tone. He needed to see this side of Tom, like the mask he was wearing was coming undone at the sides, and for the briefest of moments, he was getting a glimpse of all the cruel things that lurked underneath. Was that that Tom meant when he said _if you really knew who I was_?  
That tone was not nice, and it should have been painful for Harry to hear, it should have made him want to turn away from these people forever. But, then again, these were the first people he’d truly met, and they were such lovely people, such glittery people and he couldn’t throw that all away, no matter what tone Tom chose to address his friends in. It was probably an inside joke that he didn’t understand. Harry chose to believe that, even when none of the others was laughing. 

Harry turned back towards Lestrange, who was looking up now, his features deepening into a glare, “he insulted you too, you know,” he said with no small amount of spite, the words flicking off his tongue like they were poisonous.  
Tom didn’t react, he only leaned his head to the side and smiled with an unnerving nonchalance, “did he now?”  
“Yes actually. He said – ”  
Tom raised his hand and Lestrange stopped speaking, “I don’t care to know what he said just now, as you can see, we have a guest. We’ll talk about it later.”  
Lestrange chewed on his lip but said nothing, though the scowl did not leave his face.  
“So, Harry,” said Tom, turning back to him with a smile, “resuming our conversati– ”  
“Oh, come on Riddle,” Druella interrupted, “if all you wanted to do was to pick his brains, and coax him into bed with your opinions, then you _should_ have made a private appointment and not forced the rest of us to endure it.”  
Harry felt a flush spill like a waterfall from his cheeks down his neck, as though Druella had read and publicly shared his most private fleeting thoughts. He honestly thought that Tom might make another sharp comment a hair’s breadth from cruelty, something glimmering and gorgeous no matter how malicious it was, but he didn’t seem to care, he only smiled at Druella.  
“And why is that?” he said, all smooth and sleek.  
“Because,” she said, leaning forward, her elbows pressed uncomfortably into the wood, “I for one, do not care to know.”  
“You should always care for other people’s opinions,” he said, still smiling.  
“Not when they are on topics that do not concern me,” she replied, also smiling. The moment reminded Harry of the time of the stairs, those smiles and those looks, were the same as these. Clever repartee merging into teasing and balancing on the needlepoint of flirtatious. It made his stomach curl and twist, though he didn’t know why.  
“Surely the law concerns you? It concerns all of us,” said Tom.  
“Money makes men above the law, Riddle, you should remember that.”  
“And you are no man, Druella, you should remember that.”  
Suddenly, Rosier shut whatever book he had been reading with a slap and rolled his eyes at them, “let’s stop this now.”  
“Why?” said Tom, he’d obviously been enjoying the conversation, perhaps even at Rosier’s expense.  
“Because I wouldn’t have come here if I had known that you two were going to – flirt so shamelessly,” he said, glaring just enough to get his point across.  
“Aww, do you feel left out?” said Druella, her fingers scraping back along her brother’s arm in a way that would tickle for most people. Rosier just shook her away.  
“No, of course not. I just think there are better ways to spend our time.”  
“Such as?” said Tom, that gloating little smile back at the corners of his mouth.  
“Oh, I don’t know, Riddle, ask Avery, he’s barely said anything today.”

Avery visibly swallowed, his empty head searching for something interesting to say. Although it was almost painful to watch, Harry had to feel a little sympathy for him. After all, he’d probably been worse earlier.  
“Are you observing All Saints’ Day this year?” he said eventually, just addressing the entire room.  
“Of course, we are,” said Druella, evidently slightly irritated she was no longer the centre of attention. Harry watched silently as she rolled up a piece of paper that had been in front of her before sliding it over to Malfoy, “hit him with that for me, would you?” she said, “I mean it’s an insensitive question, Avery, you know we’re not heathens; no offence Riddle.”  
“None taken,” he said, with a quick glance over to him that Harry didn’t miss.  
“So sorry,” Avery said, rubbing his arm melodramatically from where Malfoy had defiantly taken pleasure in hitting him with the paper. “What are you doing on All Hallows’ Eve then?”  
“Oh, don’t be so pretentious, Avery, just fucking call it, Halloween, like everyone else,” said Lestrange, though he recoiled a little when Tom glared at him, and mouthed something that looked like an apology.  
Avery also glared at him.  
“Well,” said Malfoy stringing out the single syllable, and once again stepping into that mediating role he filled so well, “we talked about meeting up at the Rosier’s.”  
Heads turned back towards Rosier and Druella. She had returned her fingers to her brother’s arm, almost mimicking Malfoy’s actions earlier.  
“We’re still fine with that, and even better our grandmother won’t be around; she thinks it brings horrible bad luck to travel on Allhallowtide, and she’s stuck in Aquitaine at the moment, visiting her sick sister or something, wasn’t it?”  
Rosier shrugged.  
“That settles it then, doesn’t it?” said Malfoy, looking around the room, “doesn’t it?” he repeated until there were visible nods of people agreeing.  
It honestly felt weird, but hardly unexpected, to watch people make a plan in front of him that didn’t include him. But he’d got his taste, and that was all he had wanted, at least, he tried to convince himself of that, despite knowing he’d live the rest of his life dreaming of what it could have been if he was more interesting.  
He was raised from his gloom by Tom, watching him. “You’ll come too, won’t you, Harry?” he said, with that signature smile, “I would be _greatly_ disappointed if you couldn’t make it.”  
Harry nodded a little dumbly, his insides curling and twisting, and a slightly pathetic swell of hope rising, the thought of all those things he’d given up on, were perhaps coming into reach again, including Tom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for talking about law for too long in this chapter, I can really get carried away, apologies.


	6. fiat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for taking so long, I had a crisis of my ability to execute this, which sort of paralysed this fic's development for ages, but I think I'm over it now, so updates should be a little more frequent, at least fingers-crossed they will be.

Harry seemed to be back in the same predicament that he was always in. He was standing in front of the mirror, staring at his clothes and wishing he was someone else. Or, rather, he was wishing that he was more like _them_ ; that he possessed their natural elegance, their sophistication, that he was sure had to be learnt, but still appeared to be so effortless, and he wanted, however selfish it was, their looks. For no matter how many times he brushed his hair, and pulled and tugged at his suit, it still didn’t look _right_ on him.  
It looked like he had stolen someone else’s skin and now was trying to wear it as his own, and surely, they would see through such disguises. They would see that he did not belong as one of them, and never really would. No matter how good friends they became, there would still be that divide between them. The wealth, the looks, the family connections. He had none of them, and as far as he knew, he never would, and he wasn’t like Tom; he didn’t possess that charm or that charisma that would have salvaged him. He was simply ordinary, and no amount of staring in the mirror was ever going to change that. 

That didn’t stop him from repeatedly straightening his collar and tugging at his cuffs though. If anything, it made it worse, just knowing that everything about him screamed of mediocracy, even if he knew, somewhere in his brain, that he could not be merely _mediocre_ because they did not hang around with things, they thought were beneath them.  
Harry sighed. Rosier had been the one to give him this frankly, too formal, dress code along with their address, which he said any good taxi should know, with such a casual smile that Harry hadn’t bothered mentioning that he couldn’t afford a taxi, as in his experience, that was just met with exasperation, sometimes even horror at the thought of poverty, and all its distasteful associations.  
Needless to say, he would be walking, so it probably didn’t matter if his suit was perfect or not, because, by the time he got to their house, it most certainly wouldn’t be quite as nice as when he had started.  
The Rosiers _always_ insisted, apparently, on formal evening wear, the sort that Harry had forgotten people still wore on a semi-regular basis. To him, it rather seemed like one of those things that had been lost to antiquity, left behind at the turn of the century, but it had only been abandoned by those who couldn’t afford it. Those who could, still revelled in the fanciful nature of it all: the glitz and the glamour of changing clothes several times a day just because they could.  
Fortunately, he did have some reasonably acceptable clothes, merely because it had seemed like the sort of thing that he would be required to get at some point after studying law, after all, everyone said it was such a glamorous career. And though, he hadn’t yet been offered a glimpse of this prestige, Harry supposed it was somewhere under the drab surface of studying. 

For a minute he managed to stop fiddling and just stared. In his own eyes, he didn’t look _too_ bad, though there was a certain cheapness about the clothes, the blacks not quite black, and the crinkles evident despite ironing, but it would have to do.  
Perhaps what was worse, was that his mind was constantly calling back faint visions that he’s had ever since they’d all arranged this. Shadowy figures on the corners of his vision that for some reason his brain felt the need to compare him to, even though the figures were simply incomparable. Harry knew without having to consider, that those figures were _them_ , that much was obvious. They all looked so nice. The very thing that he so craved was so naturally woven into their skin, and more than that, for what they had, was not superficial. It went to the very core of who they were. Their skin was infused with class, the more revolutionary would perhaps have said elitism, and it went right down to their bones, filled to the brim with an organic refinement that had been growing inside them ever since they were born.  
But still, there was something under the surface that they had not yet shown him. Something off, like milk that had been left out and was just an hour from spoiling. He could practically taste it in the air around them, but if he had been asked to name what it was that he felt, he wouldn’t have been able to. It was just a feeling in his gut, that there was more to them than they let everybody see. 

He left too early, just so he could drag his heels on the ground, and be overly nervous for an event that he’d been so happy to be included in. But now that it was actually approaching, he couldn’t help but wonder whether it was all an elaborate joke for their own amusement.  
For all he knew, right now, they could be sitting on their fancy chairs, talking in their clipped accents, and laughing at his naivety, at him in general. At all the fanciful things that they must know had crossed his mind since they had deigned to include him in their lives. And the single, simple thought of Tom laughing at him was enough to almost make Harry turn back now, without so much as ever meeting them.  
But he didn’t do that, not because there was feeling deep in his stomach that his own mind was wrong and there was no way that they were laughing at him, but rather, because he did not allow himself to stop walking. Not on the corner to consider directions, nor on the bridge to observe the melding of the colours in the sky. Not for a moment did he allow himself to stop, because if he did, he knew that he would never start walking in the same direction again. Harry knew, or at least heavily suspected, that there was a very cowardly part of him that currently reigned over his emotions as a tyrant, and if he were to stop, he would be giving in to that part of him which would continue to hold him back forever. 

At least, that was what Harry would like to think was spurring him on as the sun began to set and stain the sky with a gold fire. Perhaps though, the more pressing reason was that he, once again, wanted to see Tom, wanted to see him, drink his image in, as though he were a drug, as sweet and addictive as Victorian cough syrup. It wasn’t just Tom either, though he was the most important, Harry would be lying if he said he didn’t find the others just as charming and lovely to listen and talk to, as real friends did.  
So, he didn’t dare stop, even when he feared that he was about to make a wrong turn, he just continued and hoped that he would manage to find them eventually, even if he had to walk past midnight for that to become a reality.  
Although that felt unlikely, as the address that Rosier had given him sounded distinctly familiar, though Harry couldn’t quite remember why; he certainly doubted that he’d ever been anywhere close to it before, given he could hardly afford his own hovel, even with a scholarship. He was not in the habit of entering beautiful, expensive houses that they certainly lived in.

But when he got to the street, he realised why the address had struck such a cord when it shouldn’t have. It was the same road as he had been stuck on before. The one with the parallel lines of white houses rising up like Ancient Greek columns, as gorgeous and powerful as their connotations. These were, as he had suspected, one of the homes of the wealthy beyond words. The ones to whom wealth had become an expectation and not a privilege, those who could find more and more frivolous ways to spend their money.  
The old streetlamps were lit and cast a ghostly light in a circle around their base. Just a small, cold, patch of light that lovers could stand under as they parted from each other’s company with a kiss. But, despite the romance that Harry immediately thought of, as _he_ stood under that light, he did not feel romantic, he only felt cold and rather empty. The light somehow shining on the missing space within him but being unable to fill it up. It made him painfully aware of the loneliness that had been eating into him, chewing on his heart until there was scarcely the core left.  
He stood there under the light in the darkened sky for a while, standing there and biting his lip and waiting. For what, he didn’t know, it just felt like a divine intervention was about to happen in some way, shape, or form. The sky that had failed to give him magic the other day, was now bristling again and filling the void inside him with anticipation once more.  
There was no telling how long he would have stood out there, just staring at the elegant façade of the house, the symmetry and the straight lines fixing everything in perfect order, if the door hadn’t opened, and a man that Harry didn’t recognise invited him in. 

The man did not take the liberty to introduce himself, but Harry suspected he might be part of the domestic service. He didn’t smile. All he did was, lead the way, encouraging Harry when he lingered too long.  
It was almost a surreal experience, walking in silence through such a pretty house. Every single light that they passed was blaring bright, casting gold out into the corridors and dark, dark shadows across the corners where no lights could fit. The result was almost blinding on the eyes, hurting like someone was pushing their thumb through his cornea, and it was made worse by the décor of the walls, pale cream and lined with mirrors that had gold frames. They were set in a repeating pattern that ached of a Romanesque simplicity that was only interrupted on occasion by pale doors, all of them shut. To Harry, there was something glorious in the high ceilings and perfect, smooth walls, and something delightful in the careful click that his shoes made on the pale wooden floor. He couldn’t help but think of the sort of high society that must walk along here, the sort that was defined in his mind by the sound of a woman’s heels tapping on the floor; for a moment he wondered if the novelty ever wore off, or whether Druella still smiled like a little girl as she walked every day down this masterpiece of a corridor, for that’s all it was, only a corridor.  
The doorman, or perhaps he was the butler, showed him to one of these doors, but before he could ask anything, the man had disappeared back down the corridor, apparently unwilling to interrupt whatever was going on inside the room. Harry wasn’t exactly surprised, they were intimidating at the best of times, and now they were operating on their own territory it was doubly daunting. 

Unlike the others, this door was open a crack, and Harry peeked through, unwilling to just march straight in. From what little he could see, the room was similar to the corridor, that was to say overly ornate in a simple sort of way. The walls were gold, though whether that was just because of the light, he couldn’t really tell, for, once again, there were more than enough lights turned on. Blocking most of his view though, was a sofa, he suspected it wasn’t the only one, and the two people on it. Between the shadows and the brightness, Harry could make out the profile of Tom, and Druella. They were sitting close. Too close perhaps; talking. If Harry held his breath, he could hear snatches of their conversation.  
“…Oh, come on Riddle, admit it, you like him,” said Druella, her hand coming into view as it stretched along the back of the sofa.  
“I am fascinated, that’s all,” was Tom’s reply.  
“You were fascinated by Mulciber too.”  
Tom seemed to smile and lean much closer.  
“I didn’t think we were mentioning him anymore, hmm?”  
“Well I can’t help but make comparisons,” said Druella, not drawing away from him, but rather raising her chin and letting her eyes meet his.  
Tom leaned in again, raising his hand this time and smoothing back a strand of hair that had fallen out of place.  
“Maybe you shouldn’t think of such things,” he said, his voice dipping back into the same icy pool as it had when he’d addressed Lestrange’s manners.

Harry pushed the door open. He wasn’t honestly why that moment had lent him courage, but it had, and there was no going back because the door creaked something horrible, and both Tom and Druella looked over at him.  
“Harry,” said Tom, or rather, he drawled it, dragging out every letter until Harry wished he was the only person who would ever say his name.  
“You found the address alright, then?” said Druella, sliding away from Tom, before standing up and stretching her arms out in front of her.  
“I guess so…” said Harry, feeling the words dying on his tongue as he stared at Druella. She looked gorgeous, well she always looked beautiful, but now there was an extra sparkle about her. It was the dress. How it clung to her figure, showing off her shoulder blades and the delicate bones that made up her shoulders. Harry tried to blink to stop staring, but that didn’t work.  
Druella, herself only smiled and walked around the sofa, her dress swishing as she moved so that she almost appeared to be gliding as an angel would on earth. Just a being made of light and gold fashioned into a point.  
As she walked over, Druella raised her hand in the guise of tucking her hair behind her ear, and Harry found himself following her hand with his eyes. Watching as the fingers touched her scalp and how her nails clinked against her earrings, before dropping to the straps that came up behind her neck. She ran the very tips of her fingers over those strips of gold, just showing how the neckline dipped below her collarbone and formed a pretty triangle of pale skin.  
“My grandmother never lets me wear this, but my grandmother isn’t here, and you won’t tell her, will you, Harry?”  
Harry shook his head. Mesmerised by how the gold fabric glinted off her skin, almost like magic, drawing his eye subconsciously to the delicacy of her neck and the fragility of her every bone  
“…No – I mean no, of – of course not,” he said, realising that both Tom and Druella were watching him with smiles he would have guessed were condescending.  
“S-sorry,” he mumbled.  
Though before she could make any sort of reply there was the loud sound of multiple approaching footsteps on the floors outside.

“Oh, look at that Druella, you’ve got him flustered already,” said Malfoy, arriving through the same door as Harry had come through. He was smiling, and his arms were outstretched, in that friendly sort of way that came so naturally to extroverts, and thus so unnaturally to Harry.  
“She’s stunning, isn’t she?” Malfoy murmured, his mouth suddenly much too close to Harry’s ear, and his hand ghosting across his shoulder. When Harry didn’t reply, he laughed to himself, before sweeping past him with the confidence of the host instead of the guest he was supposed to be; the same hand skimming over Druella’s waist.  
“You look exquisite. Your grandmother just has no taste.”  
Druella mouth curved into a smile again, and she raised her eyes to look directly at Malfoy.  
“Well she is seventy-four, what can you expect?”  
Malfoy looked like he was about to say something else, but a cough from Rosier distracted him.  
“I’m not touching, only complimenting,” said Malfoy, raising both his hands up for Rosier to see.  
“Such a protective brother you have.”  
“Faithful, I think is the word you’re looking for.”  
Malfoy raised an eyebrow but didn’t protest, instead, he just ambled away towards Tom, and Harry watched as that same, wandering hand, went straight to Tom’s shoulder, and, perhaps, more surprisingly, it was allowed to stay as Tom talked to him in a quiet voice that Harry couldn’t hear. 

He only realised he was standing awkwardly in the middle of the room, not helping anyone and probably getting in the way when Druella gently touched his elbow.  
“You can sit down, Harry, anywhere you like. I should have offered you something as soon as you arrived but…” she drifted off as her gaze turned to the floor, “…but I guess I was distracted.”  
“What my sister means is that we didn’t mean to neglect you, Harry,” said Rosier briefly leaving Malfoy and Tom to join them, “please don’t think us rude hosts because, I promise you, we’re not; you just happened to come in at a bad time.”  
As if on cue Lestrange and Avery came through the door, each carrying bottles that Harry assumed were of wine or some similar alcohol that he had never heard the name of.  
When Rosier saw him watching, he smiled.  
“We didn’t intend to be gone so long, but Lestrange is very particular about his alcohol. Likes to think himself a connoisseur, and so we’re always required to agree with him,” he said, “though we’ll all support you if you choose to deprecate his choices.”  
Then he was gone, leaving Harry to nod dumbly as he bustled in on Lestrange and Avery and starting to bicker with them over whether to open champagne or red wine or white or even all three.  
Harry swallowed and nervously took a seat as far from the commotion as he could, and although, he tried not to, he couldn’t help his eyes turning towards Tom, who was just watching the scene unfolding before him, apparently with amusement.  
He had returned to sitting on the sofa across from him, his arm resting lightly on the arm of the chair and the rest of his body still. Malfoy was no longer talking to him, but he was still nearby, his hand resting surreptitiously on Tom’s wrist while he loudly supported Lestrange’s bid for opening the Rosé. Tom did not offer his own suggestion. Rather as though, he was above all that petty disagreement, and the others must have understood for they didn’t bother referring to him.  
As all the others continued in their distraction, Tom’s own eyes wandered over and he smiled. Harry felt himself blushing, though there was no reason to, which just made it more embarrassing, but, fortunately, all the others were too busy to notice the flush spilling under his collar, or the way he dipped his head to avoid the intensity of Tom’s eyes. To avoid being swallowed up by feelings he was only just coming to understand but were doing their best to pick him up in their all-consuming storm. He liked the way Tom looked at him, as though he meant the world, he liked that Tom seemed to find him interesting and amusing and worth having around, it made a warmth swell in his stomach and the same fuzziness as the day before curl up through his lungs.  
When he looked back up, Tom’s eyes flicked away too fast, and he returned to watching the rest of his friends continue their bickering. 

Somehow the decision was made to open all three different bottles, and Rosier began pouring glasses without asking anyone what they wanted. Though none of them was protesting what they got, so Harry supposed they must always drink the same. That pink wine, the colour of new-spring blossom for Malfoy and Lestrange, champagne that fizzed for Rosier and Druella, a white, that had no distinguishing feature for Avery, and a dark, almost bloodlike red for Tom.  
Harry had never tried _any_ wine before, and they all looked sort of pretty. Delicate, tasteful things that sophisticated people drank as they conversed, speaking of higher things than most mere mortals could ever comprehend.  
He was pulled from his fantasies by Rosier calling his name out.  
“Harry, what do you want to drink?”  
For a moment he sat there dumbly, wondering whether it would be appropriate for him to ask the difference and if he did, whether he’d even understand what the differences actually were. They all seemed to have their benefits; he liked the way the champagne fizzed, but the rosé, as everyone kept calling it, was such a pretty candyfloss pink, but the white was nice too, the colour of those pearl earrings the girl in his tutorial always wore, but then again, the red was gorgeous and vivid and looked so dark.  
He realised he had once again been silent for too long when everyone was watching him.  
“Umm – I’ll have…”  
“He’ll have the red,” said Tom from across the room as if it was the most natural thing in the world.  
Harry nodded dumbly, half-glad that someone else had made the decision for him, and the red did look so rich and velvety. Not to mention the way it refracted through the glass and accentuated Tom’s skin, somehow making pale seem alluring. Tom only smiled at him, once again making the whole world melt away until it was just the two of them bathed in the silky world of carmine that seemed to stain everything from Tom’s mouth to his eyes. It lasted just a moment, when Tom raised his glass, the liquid caught the light and glittered back, flooding Tom’s eyes with such a warm crimson that Harry’s thoughts just stopped, and his entire mind too was flooded with that gorgeous red.  
Tom looked away when Druella started talking; though Harry would have gladly ignored her forever if it meant he got to keep staring at those lovely eyes, but he turned towards her out of politeness.  
“I do hope you’ll forgive us for not using our dear butler, Harry, we do love him to pieces, but sometimes you do want a little privacy, and humans, unfortunately, are curious creature,” she said like she wasn’t one herself.  
“That’s – fine,” Harry mumbled in reply, all too unsure how he was supposed to be commenting on domestic staff that they would hardly consider to be people, but he himself was so close to. 

There was no denying that tonight they were all so much more relaxed then all their other meetings; tonight, was less of a performance, instead, it was merely a gathering of friends. Old friends, who chatted and laughed and sniped at one another, old friends, who had witticisms and anecdotes and jests that only they understood. Though Harry did not feel excluded per se, he did not understand many of their jokes or their criticisms that they seemed to have for one another, they had readily made a space for him at their table, and he was willingly sitting in it.  
With the relaxation had come an idleness, a languor that pervaded the air and hung in every corner of the room. It slid into all of them, infecting them with its particularly beautiful disease. They were all looser, lazy in a way that was utterly enviable.  
The tension that Lestrange usually held in his shoulders, had melted away and he was sitting carelessly on the piano stall, his arms stretched out across the lid, like he was an ancient creature with wings hidden under his skin on display in some museum. He was listening minimally to the conversation, only interrupting for the most important points, and for the rest of the time simple nodding and running his finger up and down the stem of his wine glass, taking long sips of that pale pink wine he was sharing with Malfoy.  
Harry let his eyes drift further. Rosier and Druella had lost the stiffness in their backs, the rigidity with which they apparently held themselves into those perfect moulds, were gone and they were free to share a seat too small for two people. Their arms touched, and their knees, and their thighs all tangled together until Harry could hardly tell one from the other. They were both swallowing their champagne as though it were water, and Rosier was talking about something Harry wasn’t really following,  
For whatever reason, the coldness that had surrounded them in their first meeting had also dissipated, and in its place had bloomed a certain friendliness, even Avery smiled at him. His mouth being pulled by invisible strings, forcing him to pretend to be happy, even when he clearly wasn’t.  
Avery was curled up on his own at the other end of the sofa to Harry. He was closest to Lestrange but Lestrange wasn’t in a conversing mood apparently, and so he was doing as Harry was, watching the others with an ill-disguised interest. Unlike Harry though, he was readily swallowing down his glass of white wine that no one else appeared to want to touch.  
That only left Malfoy and Tom. They were sharing a sofa, Tom in the corner and Malfoy stretched out across the entire thing, his head in Tom’s lap. Tom appeared to be ignoring him for the most part, though every so often his hand would touch Malfoy’s hair, and Malfoy was stretch out that little bit further, rather like a cat having its chin stroked. 

“So, Potter,” said Malfoy interrupting the discussion on where the best location for a third home, Harry would have agreed with Rosier that Paris seemed quite nice, but then again, Druella seemed to make a compelling argument for India. Not that that stopped Malfoy, who’d put his glass down on the floor and was now looking over at him.  
“What do think of the Great British Empir– ?”  
“ _Riddle_ ,” said Rosier and Druella together, “stop interrogating him.”  
Tom had the audacity to look offended at them.  
“I think you’ll find Malfoy was the one asking the question,” he said, his hands still carding through Malfoy’s hair as though it wasn’t attached to the very person he was talking about.  
“I had nothing to do with it.”  
“Perhaps you didn’t ask it, but you put Malfoy up to it, didn’t you?” said Rosier, his eyebrow raised and look on his face that Harry would genuinely think was rather fraternal. That was nice, in a way, he’d never had anyone say anything for him before, even if, in this particular case he would have been quite happy to talk about anything at all if it meant he got to watch Tom uninhibited and have his voice solely directed at him.  
“I wouldn’t dream of it, Rosier,” said Tom, snapping Harry from his pleasant little fantasy.  
If it was possible Rosier raised his eyebrow higher, “oh, I think you would,” he said in that goading sort of way that Harry was starting to learn was Rosier’s speciality.  
Tom, though, continued, unfazed by whatever tone Rosier chose to use to form his words.  
“Does that mean, you think that Malfoy couldn’t come up with that question on his own? Because that’s what it sounds like.”  
“He wouldn’t ask it at a party because he has common courtesy,” said Druella, wading somewhat unnecessarily into the argument, mostly, Harry suspected, because it was an argument, and she was drawn like a magnet to all arguments.  
“Then you insult him, Druella.”  
“And you flatter him.”  
“You do realise that I am right here!” said Malfoy, sitting up and glaring at both twins, though Harry noticed his head was angled just slightly more towards Rosier than Druella, but he supposed that was probably because Rosier was lower in the pecking order, and thus easier to insult without serious consequences.  
Tom continued to be apathetic on the sidelines, not glaring at anyone, if anything, he rather looked like he had enjoyed stirring the proverbial pot, causing a disagreement simply because it gave them something to do for fifteen minutes of their lives.  
“I am quite aware that you’re here, Abraxas,” said Tom, running his fingers down Malfoy’s neck, until he turned towards him, “that’s why I defended you; I wouldn’t have bothered if you hadn’t been present to hear them.”  
Rosier visibly rolled his eyes, and Harry found himself swallowing.  
There was something in Tom’s tone that was different, something much more intimate in the way he smiled at Malfoy like they had a secret and flaunted the fact constantly, winding the others up like toys, but never confirming their suspicions.  
“Oh, don’t make that face, Rosier,” Tom said, still not taking his eyes off Malfoy, “there’s nothing wrong with a little flattery now and then; is there, Harry?”  
Harry was caught off guard by the statement and found himself shaking his head, though he wasn’t sure if he was agreeing or disagreeing. Not that Tom seemed to particularly care which way his answer fell, simply that he had answered.  
“See? Not everyone is so averse to praising their friends.”

Rosier made the sensible decision not to argue and sunk silently back into the chair, further entangling himself with his sister, and with him, the entire conversation dulled as lightbulb does when the filament is breaking.  
The boredom that took hold of them all, almost instantly, was quite palpable in the air, heavy like the wine on his tongue, Harry could almost taste its syrup balm as it coated his throat.  
“Well this is dull,” said Avery in that condescending way, as though he had always suspected that this evening was going to be the most boring thing in the world, and that, like a petulant child, he was only here on the whims of other people.  
“What would you prefer to talk about, then?” said Lestrange suddenly, “Politics? Current Affairs? Gossip? If you’d actually suggest something instead of just whining about how dull this all is, then maybe something would happen,” he finished, as he leaned forward to top up his glass.  
When he leaned back again, he did not continue, but rather, just closed his eyes. Lestrange looked, in that moment, entirely exhausted; dark circles that he could see from across the room under his eyes, and a slowness in his movements that could not be solely attributed to relaxation. The probable cause was the first formative assignments were coming out for the third and fourth years. Harry had overhead others talking about them, about how long they were, and how unnecessary such a length truly was for what needed to be said about the problem. He had no idea if that problem in question was the same one that Lestrange had been battling with, but it might have explained his apparent apathy towards the entire evening and the willingness with which he drank his wine.  
“ _Anything_ ,” said Avery, though Harry had practically forgotten that anyone else was here, given he was so caught up in Lestrange, and it _was_ so easy to just get caught up in their faces, and their actions, and their everything.  
“Fine then, Avery, what was that book were you reading the other day?” said Druella with a loud sigh.  
Avery looked up at her, almost in surprise that any of them had actually decided that the silence was more irritating than talking to him.  
“What book?” he said ever so innocently.  
“The one I saw you with, in the library on Thursday. Do tell me about it.”  
“Why?”  
“Because I’m bored, and I want to know the disgusting things you read when you think no one’s looking.”  
Avery half smiled, half sneered, but didn’t deny her an answer.  
“It was ‘God’s little acre’; it’s good, but not your sort of thing.”  
“ _God’s little acre_ ,” she repeated to herself, “that hardly sounds like _your_ sort of thing either, being about God at all.”  
“It’s not about God.”  
“Oh, of course it isn’t.”

“Isn’t it that one that they consider to be obscene,” said Lestrange, from across the room. He had opened his eyes for the briefest moment to ask, and now was closing them again.  
Harry couldn’t help but watch him, leaning back so elegantly against the piano, some would have said draped, but that implied such elegance was intentional, which the action wasn’t, it was merely innate. The sort of thing that good breeding encouraged, and if Harry so glanced the other way, and looked at Tom, he could see the slightest differences in their beings. For whilst Tom might have possessed that same grace, his whole façade was just slightly tauter, stretched and ironed out to perfection. He had watched and imitated what he saw, and if he could do it, then Harry surely could as well.  
Harry could have stayed staring for longer, but the flutter of conversation drew him as it does a moth to a bare lightbulb.  
Druella was talking, and whenever Druella was talking, something interesting must be being said. “…Simply, all the best books in the world are obscene,” she was saying to no one in particular.  
“Even the Bible?” countered Avery, in a way that just so wanted to catch her without her wit.  
“Especially the Bible,” she replied with a smile that showed too much of her tongue, “it’s really rather _filthy_ , as you’d know if you bothered to read it.”  
Harry swallowed for there was a bite to her words that made him uncomfortable, made him feel that there was bad blood between the two of them that somehow had stumbled back into the open again.  
“Is that what you do in your spare time, then, read biblical erotica? Because that’s not something I wanted to know about you, Druella,” said Avery with a disdain that was, quite frankly, unmistakeable, and even made Lestrange open his eyes again.  
“It’s only sex, Avery, just because you’re not getting any, it doesn’t mean the rest of us have to be prudes.”  
Avery scoffed.  
“Oh, but you are such a _good_ one, Druella. You like to speak of obscenity whilst you practice that virginal innocence that your family so adores.”  
Harry had never seen someone’s expression turn to murderous as quickly as Druella’s did, but it fell as fast as a stone into a glare that could’ve rivalled Tom’s.  
“I respect my family name, and, my faith, Avery, but respect isn’t something that you understand, is it? And if we are speaking of our dualities, then perhaps we should consider your own; for the things you promised us, have certainly not materialised. Of course, a lot can be learnt from just talking about the obscene, and a certain appreciation for oneself is definitely developed.”  
Avery continued to smirk and leaned forward a little.  
“I just think that a woman, such as yourself, shouldn’t talk of what she doesn’t know, that’s all.”  
Druella did not lean forward, or make any movement at all, she just stayed perfectly still, her eyes set upon Avery’s.  
“Well, _Avery_ , a woman, such as myself, learns that men cannot guarantee satisfaction, and as I said, I enjoy my own company, and you’ll find I’m very good with my fingers.”  
The room was silent for several, painful, seconds where no one moved, not even to take a drink. Harry knew he swallowed too loudly and that his eyes were darting between them as though this were a game of tennis, where the objective was one of insulting repartee.  
Avery opened his mouth again, but he didn’t get to say anything because Tom interrupted before the first word could leave.  
“I wouldn’t feel the need to speak again, if I were you, Avery.”  
“Well, thankfully, this isn’t your conversation, Riddle.”  
Tom didn’t smile, nor did he glare. The only discernible emotion that Harry could possibly find on his face was one of profound disappointment.  
“Care to step outside?”  
“I didn’t mean it,” said Avery suddenly, the same poignant awareness of the sudden gravity of the situation as Lestrange had had in the library. It was moments like this that just suggested there was something more hanging between them, just too high up for Harry to see.  
“Didn’t you, Avery?” said Tom, pushing Malfoy gently until he moved, “Because it seemed like you meant something, but if you’d just step outside, I’m sure we can form a better understanding of what that was, hmm?”  
Avery visibly swallowed, and for a second Harry thought that he might challenge Tom, but then whatever fearlessness had grown, died with just as much vigour, and Avery dutifully got up.  
Tom followed him out the door. 

For a moment the rest of them sat in silence, just watching each other.  
“Avery never does know when to shut his mouth,” said Lestrange casually.  
“Well, he’d better learn,” said Druella, as she got up to pour herself another glass of champagne, before swallowing it down in one gulp, and repeating the action.  
“Oh, I think he will, you know what Riddle’s like.”  
Harry couldn’t help but notice how Malfoy’s eyes flicked over to him, just for a second, before he lay back again, apparently finding intense interest in the ceiling.  
Lestrange also took the opportunity to move off of the piano stall that must have been quite uncomfortable by now and slipping onto the sofa between Harry and where Avery was sitting. He smiled lazily when Harry looked over at him and spread himself further into Avery’s side, but he didn’t bother saying anything, after all, what was there to be said when such an elephant continued to loom in the room.  
As the silence rolled on, Harry took another small sip of his wine. It wasn’t bad as such, just intensely different from anything he’d ever had before; fuller and richer in a way he couldn’t quite explain. The edge of bitterness on his tongue that should have been disgusting but somehow improved the overall experience. It certainly wasn’t awful, and if it made him look even half as sophisticated as he felt then surely it must be worth the very slight woolliness that was creeping into his vision, rather like someone had just covered everything inside his head with a thin layer of cotton wool and it made it harder for his thoughts to move around. But none of the others seemed to notice so Harry supposed the feeling must have all been in his head. 

It was a good fifteen minutes of silence and sipping before Tom followed by a significantly more subdued looking Avery came back into the room. He didn’t say anything only wandered back to his seat, glaring at Lestrange for taking his cushion and sat down.  
“Anything to say, Avery?”  
Avery obviously swallowed down a glare that could have killed Tom if it were allowed to gain full strength.  
“I would like to apologise, Druella.”  
“What for?”  
They could all but hear Avery grinding his teeth together, and Harry followed how he glanced again at Tom, who continued to sit still, Malfoy faithfully back in his lap, and running his fingertips over Tom’s hands. He was watching Avery, and if Harry wasn’t mistaken, there was a threat of sorts in his eyes. A dark, almost violent, thing that made silent and deeply unpleasant promises if Avery didn’t go through with this.  
“For everything that I’ve said to you this evening. It was immature of me to have insulted you in such a way in your own home.”  
“Doesn’t that imply you’d gladly insult me anywhere else,” shot back Druella, not even bothering to disguise the venom in her voice.  
“Actually, I would very happil– ” Avery stopped mid-sentence when Tom coughed, “what I mean is that it was wrong to insult you, and I am ashamed that I did so, and I apologise for it.”  
“What about my sex?”  
“Excuse me?”  
“I’d like an apology for all the women that you chose to insult with your rather crude statement,” Druella said, crossing her legs and arms in synchrony, her own hard stare akin to Tom’s settled on her features.  
If it were possible Avery’s glare deepened further, but he managed to force a smile.  
“I wholeheartedly apologise for everything that I said which insulted yourself, and every other woman to have preceded or succeeded you.”  
Druella nodded, “thank you, Avery. Just try to keep your mouth shut in the first place, next time.”

The conversations continued to drift on a barely chartered path, though now it was limited to just Lestrange, Rosier and Druella. Avery was listening but paying more attention to his glass and not making an attempt to contribute, and Tom and Malfoy seemed to be involved in their own personal conversation.  
Harry watched them, as subtly as he could, which probably wasn’t as subtle as he’d like to think it was. From this angle, he was finally able to appreciate just how much Malfoy touched Tom. He’d always noticed before how close their hands were, or how they lingered together for far longer than necessary, but he’d never ben able to fully appreciate _just_ what it looked like, and just how little the others seemed to care.  
Tom had his fingers buried in Malfoy’s hair and was stroking it lightly, watching as Malfoy arched his neck a little more and leaned into his touch. Every so often, Tom’s fingers would trace a single strand of his hair all the way down to his ribs, and then trail back up again with what must have been an excruciating slowness. In those moments, Malfoy never took his eyes off of Tom. Instead, he lay, perfectly motionless as Tom’s hands wandered, and all the others talked about whatever new performance was on at the Royal Ballet this month.  
Tom’s hands were quite fascinating really; both so deliberate as they scraped the edge of Malfoy’s neck, and at the same time, almost absent-minded, how someone might stroke a pet if it laid down beside them. Harry shouldn’t have wanted to be in his place, he shouldn’t have wanted to be the one lying beside Tom with his hands in his hair, but he did. He did very much want that, and maybe a little more.  
That empty space that had been so illuminated by the lights outside, was nigh on aching with want for human touch, and for more than that, for the touch of one specific person. He had never wanted someone else more than now, as he watched how Malfoy encouraged Tom’s fingers to curl into the space where his neck met his shoulder, and how he practically purred when those fingers slid into the gully of his collarbone, stroking back and forth ever so slowly.

Harry watched in silent disbelief as the fingertips disappeared and reappeared from view as Tom peeled back Malfoy’s shirt and continued to trace his bones. Never before had Harry seen two people so brazen with their affection in front of others before, for whenever he accidentally stumbled in on the couples in classrooms, said classrooms and lecture theatres and hallways were always silent and empty, those people didn’t want to be seen and much less caught. Here and now though, was a very different matter. Here and now, they didn’t seem to care if the others noticed how _intimate_ Tom’s hands were getting. One still pressed into Malfoy’s hair, the other running light fingers over the very top of his thigh, only stopping when Malfoy closed his eyes and started to chew on his lip, rather like Harry was doing now.  
That thought opened up a whole different alley, and suddenly the only thought in Harry’s mind was of him lying there feeling Tom’s fingers against his skin. He’d never had someone else touch him before, let alone like that. The closest he’d ever got before was his own hand, numb from being trapped under his pillow, pressed into his thigh, but that didn’t look like it felt the same; it wasn’t as careful as Tom’s, or as gentle, or as personal.  
The others continued that apathy to Tom’s actions even as Tom leaned down so that his hair fell forward and his lips could quite have easily touched Malfoy’s cheek, and murmured something; his mouth entirely too close to Malfoy’s skin. Harry could see how Malfoy’s throat rose and fell as he swallowed, but he didn’t make any move to push Tom away, if anything, it looked like he leaned in even closer, mumbling something back to him that Tom seemed to like. 

A few minutes later Malfoy got up, and mumbling something about a glass of water, he left the room, though not before he’d grabbed the bottle of red wine on his way out. The only two to even notice his leaving were Rosier, who just rolled his eyes and continued debating with Lestrange the intricacies of wine pairings, and Avery, who also rolled his eyes in an entirely different way and muttered something that only Tom seemed to catch.  
Whatever it was made Tom glare at Avery, and a little while later when Tom left the room, he caught Avery’s arm on his way out and made him spill his drink onto the floor. Tom didn’t apologise for that, and Avery didn’t ask him to, they just glanced at each other for a moment before Avery was grabbing a napkin from the table and dropping it to soak up the pale liquid before it seeped into the carpet, whilst Tom just smirking from the doorway. And still no one questioned the interaction or Tom’s leaving, nor did they bother to ask where he was going. Harry was starting to think that they simply didn’t care enough to ask.  
Harry could have done, and perhaps he should have done, but somehow it didn’t feel like his place to do so. It didn’t feel like it was his place to question the actions or the motivations of any of them, so he just stayed in his corner of the sofa, taking small sips of his wine, and feeling the world start to go a little fuzzy at the edges.  
In that half-daze that came between the door closing and Harry turning back to the other’s conversation, Harry would have sworn he saw Tom’s smile in the crack and he blushed at what was probably just his imagination, but just _might_ have been something more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope this was alright, and as I've started the next chapter, that should be up relatively soon; but in the meanwhile thank you for your continued patience.


	7. prima facie

Malfoy and Tom had been gone for a long time now. Far longer than it was surely necessary to get a glass of water, no matter where they were getting it from, and still none of the others seemed to care. They continued to lie there and talk, their conversations sliding over one another, melting like candlewax into each other until Harry’s head hurt. The clock seemed to have sped up too, and it chimed again too soon, that long low sound resonating across the room, and still none of the others seemed to care. Only Avery glanced at the mantlepiece as he reached for his glass again, tipping his head back to drain it, throat moving softly as he swallowed.  
Conversations resumed; a murmuring of voices that were barely there, just shadows dancing on the walls, folding in on themselves and starting anew over and over again.  
“Where’s Tom?” Harry heard himself saying, though the words themselves were sticky and distant as if someone else were speaking them.  
“With Malfoy, obviously,” said Lestrange, leaning his head back on the edge of the sofa, and stretching out like a true cat, but not bothering to get up.  
“Yeah, I bet they’re having a lot of…” Druella paused and smiled, in a lazy and knowing way, “…fun,” she finished, somehow entangling herself further into her brother, until it was almost impossible to divide the two of them, as though they were conjoined at the heart.  
“But who can blame him,” she continued, “Malfoy’s _awfully_ entertaining when he’s out of it.”  
Lestrange smirked.  
“Still remember what he did to Mulciber?” he said, “that was a work of art.”  
He continued to smile and Rosier and Druella sniggered with him in some private joke. Avery still didn’t say anything, he just poured himself another drink and stared at the ceiling.  
“Who’s Mulciber?” said Harry, looking between them. He knew he’d been too quiet this evening, sure, he’d discussed the benefits of a university education, and those policies to help the less fortunate access such an education that Rosier said were frankly overrated. But he hadn’t really _said_ much, and Harry wasn’t aware of any Mulcibers that they all associated with, or even at the university. There certainly weren’t any wings, or libraries, or other important buildings, named after them.  
But none of the others were reacting, they were just staring at the walls and at each other like they were sharing memories simply through sight. Lestrange, for his part, just continued to smirk.  
“He’s a nobody,” he said lazily, dragging out the syllables until they were ringing through Harry’s head. A nobody. That was what he was one step away from, and if they so choose, he could once again be relegated down to nobody status, and then he really would have nothing. 

Harry was only interrupted from his thoughts, and the others from their conversation by a slight noise at the door.  
“Oh, would someone go and open that,” said Rosier, clearly unwilling to move, himself.  
Harry was going to get up, but Lestrange beat him to it. He clambered unsteadily to his feet but walked to the door with the ease of someone who knows the furniture’s positioning well.  
He only opened the door a crack, and Harry strained to see what possibly could warrant it. Perhaps the strange butler-servant, or Tom and Malfoy, or… something hazy that his mind couldn’t quite focus on.  
His questions, though, were quickly answered with a small meow, as an impossibly fluffy cat trotted around the sofa and towards Druella and Rosier; the latter of whom cooed instinctively. Avery merely rolled his eyes, but still stroked its fur as it went past. It was a pretty cat, though Harry would hardly have expected anything less. A pedigree, most certainly, but what type he was at loss to answer, and unwilling to ask; all he _could_ appreciate was that it was very fluffy. Long white hair that darkened around its face and paws, and big blue eyes that were more intelligent than a mere cat deserved to be.  
It wandered, slowly, and not particularly purposefully towards Rosier, before jumping up onto his lap, somehow managing to land between the limbs as gracefully as any bird. Rosier immediately started stroking and fussing over it, clicking with his tongue whilst his sister looked on in apathy. Eventually, Rosier turned his eyes upward and smiled across to Harry.  
“Harry, meet Aloysius; Aloysius meet Harry,” he said, holding it up in a way that didn’t look entirely comfortable, but nor seemed to annoy the cat. It just hung there, good-naturedly, the only sign of annoyance being a mild flicking of its tail.  
He wasn’t entirely sure what he was supposed to do, whether Rosier was looking for a wave, or a formal introduction, or a smile, and no one seemed to give any indication, so he just sort of nodded. But that was enough to satisfy Rosier as he let the cat fall to the ground; it landed heavily on the wood. Aloysius shook himself and continued his meandering to the other sofa that had stayed painfully empty without Tom or Malfoy to fill it. 

Lestrange, meanwhile, had sat back down on the piano stall, instead of walking in the way of the cat, and now Avery had done his best to imply he wasn’t welcome back onto the sofa, by stretching his legs out until they almost touched Harry.  
Someone, though Harry couldn’t really remember who, or when, had opened the lid of the piano and now the keys were all exposed. And Lestrange looked entirely ready to tinker with them, run his fingers all the way down, and then, back up again, but before he could, Druella eyed him and spoke.  
“I don’t like you that close to the piano,” she said, as her fingers mimicked how one might play the keys, but against her brother’s thigh.  
“Hey,” said Lestrange, though, despite the fact it was technically a protest, he didn’t bother trying to defend himself, so there was probably some truth in the statement.  
Rosier leaned towards Harry but didn’t bother getting up.  
“You know, despite lessons for all his life, he can’t play for love nor money, nor even for his life I imagine, and frankly, it’s awful to hear him try.”  
“Godawful,” offered Avery, though it was shot down with a glare from Druella.  
“I was only agreeing with your brother,” Avery snapped, “and so with _you_ ; we all know that even I play better, and I’ve only just started learning,” he continued, apparently undeterred in his bitterness, now that Tom was out of the room.  
“Do you play, Harry?” said Rosier, a little too obviously trying to steer the conversation away from an argument.  
“A little,” he said, and it wasn’t a lie, at school it had been mandatory, and then he’d always watched when someone had played the piano at home, in silence, of course, but still he’d watched, and could probably still play the barest nursery rhyme.  
“Well, you’ll have to play for me one day; I get everyone to,” said Druella, her fingers still tapping out a rhythm. “I prefer people who have musical talent, it makes them more interesting.”  
“Well thanks,” came Lestrange’s sarcastic reply from the piano stall, though he had got up and now went to join Aloysius on the empty sofa.  
“You know, whilst I might not have wanted Lestrange to play, must we just sit in silence?” said Druella again, now turning her head to the side, her neck curved slightly, and addressing as the room at large. I  
t was as though she said it at the perfect time to have been labelled as perverse, and they all probably would have done if they didn’t like her so much. Or rather, Harry suspected, if _Tom_ didn’t like her so much.  
“Well, what else do you propose?” Avery said with a sigh that suggested he really didn’t care for the answer anymore, only that it came without him having to interact with Druella.  
“Oh, just put on the Requiem or something, I don’t want to think tonight; I do that every day.”  
“Which one?” said Lestrange, already getting up again.  
“Mozart, you cretin. Honestly, it’s embarrassing how little you know about good music.”  
Harry found himself smiling at the exchange, at the sheer domesticity of it all; how these people that were so revered and respected by their peers for their maturity and dignity, and yet here they all were smiling squabbling over something as simple as background music. 

As the music played, almost echoing around the room, and the murmur of conversation fell and swelled with the notes, the images of the world began to slide together. Rosier blurred into his sister, one creature made with four arms and four legs, hands seeming to rest where hands didn’t belong and a smile that just seemed too wide to be real. Avery was melting too, vanishing into the background, dissolving like seafoam into the sofa. His hair merging with the fabric and lacing itself into the edges, until Harry couldn’t see the difference without shaking his head and blinking several times.  
He turned his head to the side and watched Lestrange, but even he was starting to blur at the edge, his image distorting before Harry’s eyes. The shadows all too dark and the highlights too bright and everything covered with a fine haze that just smudged reality. Watching Lestrange with his head back against the sofa, was like watching Tom when he smiled in that special way. Like this, they did look rather alike, with the same shade of hair and skin. But if Harry were to move closer, he would be reminded of the distinctions between them. What they shared, was merely a superficial resemblance, like the one between himself and Tom. Perhaps it was the mere presence of dark hair and pale skin that got him thinking of Tom, because the more he stared at Lestrange, the less he looked at all like Tom. His cheekbones weren’t so defined, and his eyes were more colourful than Tom’s, and his face had a dusting of freckles across the nose. He was plainer, simpler, perhaps even cruder; a version that was by no means ugly, but also not quite perfection. He didn’t really look like Tom at all. 

It was past eleven when everything truly started to blur into everything else; the colours and the shapes of the room sloshing and sliding around like they were caught on a boat in a storm. And then there was the heat.  
Harry could practically see it from the fire across the room, rising up and flooding the air with a great noxious warmth, it was cleaving and coalescing with the heat from the radiators until the whole room was so steeped in a cloying syrup that he felt sick.  
None of the others did. They just talked, their words all sliding together into an undecipherable mess; half-formed sentences colliding with half-formed ideas, all hazed at the edges, all too thick and meaningless to see through. Just the rich words of rich people who had no real ideas of their own.  
And it was too hot.  
Too hot to think, too hot to talk, too hot to do anything but sit here and sip his drink that someone had refilled without him asking, or even noticing. But Harry didn’t want to drink anymore, he wanted a glass of water, more than a glass, he wanted to just lie in a bath filled with cold water and ice. He’d almost be willing to drown if the water that killed him was cool and clear. Perhaps Malfoy had had the right idea about getting a glass of water, even if it took him way too long to go and get it.  
And still none of the others seemed to worry, nor even notice that he was burning up, melting like a taper from the inside out, his insides dissolving and his skin practically dripping off his bones. Without having to check, Harry knew his hair must be damp, as so were his palms and his neck, and his lungs had to work so much harder just to push the oxygen around his blood, and yet his head continued to ache from the lack of air. 

Without saying anything Harry stood up and stumbled out of the room. None of the others said anything, none of them tried to stop him or even help him. They just watched in their silent apathy.  
Though as soon as he was in the corridor, gulping at the cool oxygen that was so different from their sticky air, he thought he heard Druella’s voice.  
“Why did you mention, Mulciber?” she said, the clip in her voice sounding… angry, perhaps even a little nervous.  
Lestrange sighed, “just a slip of the tongue; it’s been less than three months, I can’t just– ”  
“Yes, you can,” she cut in, “we can’t undo what’s been done…”  
She said more, so did the others, but Harry didn’t hear them, he was too busy stumbling down the corridor, feeling the floor slide beneath his feet, and the walls swaying, undulating as though they were made of jelly.  
How he managed to find a bathroom was a miracle. He’d just tried every door until he’d fallen against black and white tiles and been tempted to stay lying there forever. The floor was so cold, so hard and so, so real; compared to the softness he’d just come from, the feeling of permanently floating up in the sky, hot under the sun, the tangibility of it all was refreshing. Here was something he could touch, hold, wrap his fingers around and understand.  
Slowly though, he got to his feet because, no matter how pleasant it was, lying on someone else’s bathroom floor wasn’t particularly good manners, and if they found him, he couldn’t imagine they’d invite him back, and even if they did, he doubted the mortification of it would actually allow him to return.  
Instead, he gripped the sink and watched his reflection sway; his hair was merging with his eyes and his mouth slipping to the left. He felt nauseous. Both crammed full and desperately hollow and he didn’t know why. There was just a feeling he couldn’t quite identify pulling all the wires in his stomach, plucking on him like he was an instrument, just plucking and plucking until he feared that his strings would snap.  
He splashed his face with cold water.  
It was like dipping himself into nirvana, an oasis in the desert he hardly knew he was wandering through. He did it again. And again. And again. Not caring if the tips of his hair got wet, not caring if the water ran down his sleeves and tickled the length of his arm. All that mattered was that he was cool. Before his eyes, the fog began to lift and the haze started to clarify again, whatever had been blocking his lungs became dislodged and he could breathe, breathe in the cool air and swallow down cold water.  
Despite the newfound sobriety of the moment, it was still a good few minutes before Harry straightened up.  
There was still an ache in his head, and a heaviness to his limbs, but at least the world wasn’t spinning anymore; at least he could think. The bathroom was entirely too big, too empty, the space between the sink and the bath felt like it was miles long, his entire life could fit into this bathroom and he’d still have room to spare. It was impressive but also unnerving, how could people even be _this_ rich? Just thinking about it was sickening and gorgeous, and as much as Harry wanted to deny it, he wanted the things they had, who wouldn’t? 

He _was_ going to go back to the others, but he went the wrong way. Or at least, he assumed it must have been the wrong because there was nothing he recognised; just more pristine doors and high ceilings and mirrors that seemed to give more and more distorted reflections. To make it all worse, the entire house was submerged in a murkiness. All the lights that had practically blinded him when he had first arrived had now been turned off and Harry found himself hopelessly feeling along each wall, probably leaving fingerprints across their perfect mirrors, just so he could try every door.  
He was about to give up entirely when he noticed a sharp strip of light much further along, it didn’t feel quite the right colour as the gold of the room he’d come from. This was dimmer, darker.  
But it didn’t matter if it wasn’t them, it just had to be someone, even if it was just their silent butler, he’d be able to tell him how he was supposed to get back to them.

Harry went to the door, it was ajar slightly, enough that he could look in. It appeared to be yet another unnecessary sitting room, filled with such high ceilings and such dazzling lights; the only difference was that here the furniture was darker. It was filled with hard, almost black woods and red fabric, and far more mirrors than were humanly necessary, practically one on every wall. It was rather more intimidating than inviting.  
The room was empty aside for Tom and Malfoy, who were sitting on the sofa with their backs to him, feet up on a low table, drinks precariously close to the edge. Tom’s jacket was folded on the arm of the chair, Malfoy's was flung carelessly across the seat. Harry could see them reflected back at him in the mirror on the opposite wall, and a mirror couldn’t lie.  
They were sitting unusually close, looking too comfortable together. Their shoulders touching, their fingers too; they were talking quietly, faces ever so near each other.  
“…She’s right you know, you _do_ have a – thing for people like you,” Malfoy was saying, just loud for him to hear, as he leaned further back into the chair. His shirt was undone a few too many buttons, and his hair was no longer tied back, and now fell about his face; elegantly bedraggled.  
“Excuse me?” said Tom, his tone all soft, and as sweet as dessert wine.  
“You have a thing for people like you,” Malfoy repeated, “Mulciber, Avery, Potter, even Warren by Lestrange’s account. Pretty eyes, empty pockets; little lost lambs that _need_ you.”  
Tom smiled.  
“What does that make you then?” he said, with a tone, Harry would almost think was smug.  
Malfoy frowned and shifted once more, turning to the side.  
“I’m… the exception. All the others – they fit your…” Malfoy paused, searching his mouth for the right the words, “…taxonomy,” he said eventually.  
“They’re all isolated, directionless – they want something.”  
“They want me,” interrupted Tom.  
“Yes… but– ”  
“Is it a problem?” said Tom, and Harry couldn’t help but notice the way that his fingers just touched Malfoy thigh as he said the words, lingering for a second too long, and then another second, and another.  
“No. I was merely – making a comment.”  
“Well it sounded more like you were passing judgement,” Tom murmured, his fingers starting to wander a little higher, “that you were practically criticising me.”  
“Would I dare?” said Malfoy, leaning obscenely close, his own fingers resting on a cushion right by Tom’s arm. He looked, for a moment, like he was going to kiss Tom, but before he could, Tom shifted away.  
“Absolutely,” Tom said, stretching his legs out and bumping them against Malfoy’s. Malfoy smiled and knocked Tom’s legs back, his hand moving over and actually resting on Tom’s thigh.  
Harry swallowed and blinked a couple of times, but every time he opened his eyes again Malfoy’s hand was still there, his fingers rubbing small circles that would have made most people absolutely squirm.  
“You do know,” Malfoy murmured, “I’ve known you for a long time now.”  
“Four years is hardly _long_.”  
“It feels a long time to me,” Malfoy said airily, as though there were memories playing like a film inside his head, even though his hand continued sliding up Tom’s thigh in a way that just couldn’t be absent-minded.  
Tom just laughed. It was a light airy thing that made Harry’s stomach twirl like a rhythmic gymnast’s ribbon.  
“You’re so _adorably_ sentimental.”  
Malfoy lifted his hand and hit Tom playfully in the stomach.  
“You’ll be too – when you find someone,” he said, and Harry would have had to be truly unobservant not to notice the hint of sadness that coloured every note in Malfoy’s voice.  
Tom only sighed.  
“Perhaps; perhaps not.”  
“It could be him. I see the way you _watch_ him. I see how much you _want_ him.”  
“You have too many opinions,” said Tom dropping his head onto the back of the sofa, before turning it to face Malfoy.  
“You like my opinions,” Malfoy mumbled, leaning over and pressing his mouth to Tom’s. 

A heat curled down Harry’s spine and hooked itself inside his stomach as he slowly realised what he was seeing, but still not quite believing it. He’d never seen two boys kiss before. He’d imagined it, oh he had _imagined_ what it would look like a thousand times, but this had never come to mind. Something so soft and sweet and natural. The gorgeously gentle way that Tom’s hand came up to hold Malfoy’s cheek and pull him just that little bit closer.  
Harry had to wonder briefly if they realised what they were doing: if they were fully conscious of who each other were, or rather _what_ each other were. Malfoy’s face was certainly a little flushed, the pink stain so obvious against his pale skin, and even from this distance, it was clear his eyes were dim, and every action was just a little sloppier than usual. Harry would believe Malfoy if he said he didn’t know what he was doing, but he wouldn’t believe Tom. He still looked as composed as always, still precise and serene, perhaps a little more relaxed than usual, but still calm and collected and completely in control. He knew exactly whose mouth he was kissing, and he didn’t seem to care.  
“I suppose, he’s quite pleasant,” continued Tom, making no attempt to divorce himself from Malfoy’s mouth.  
Malfoy shifted again, his whole body turning now.  
“Just pleasant?” he mumbled, the words blurring into Tom’s lips, “how – underwhelming. By the way you were staring… I thought he’d made – more of an impression on you?”  
Malfoy’s thighs were spread across Tom’s lap now and they were still kissing. Tom still making no effort to stop him.  
“I never said he hadn’t made an impression,” said Tom between the lazy kisses that Harry realised were making his heart beat a little too loudly, so much that it was banging in his head, louder than even than the clock on the mantlepiece. A constant throbbing that made his head sway and his hands damp and everything felt like it was blurring together in a great mess of actions and noises and emotions, and all because they were talking about _him_. Well, they might not have been, but God, did he hope they were. Standing there, hidden away in the shadows he was willing to pray to any god whose name he knew, just in case one of them could grant his wish to be the one Tom found _pleasant_. 

When Harry refocused his attention, they were still talking and still kissing and still unaware that their privacy was more than a little compromised. Not that he would tell, and even if they thought he would, they weren’t going to murder him or anything.  
“…Just not a very big impression – apparently,” Malfoy said, as he touched Tom’s face so gently, like a child exploring something new for the first time, but by the looks of it, this was not a new experience for either of them. It was all too perfect, too planned; they each had a role to play and they knew exactly how to play it. They had done this before. Snuck off when they thought none of the others would notice, and then spent the evening tasting each other’s mouths.  
“I’d have thought you’d be very anxious to keep him from making any impressions,” said Tom, and Harry could see the tips of his fingers tracing down Malfoy’s shoulders before disappearing out of view, obscured by Malfoy’s own body.  
“And why – why would that be?”  
“Because, Abraxas,” he said, watching as Malfoy swallowed thickly, “then I’d stop doing this to you.”  
Whatever Tom did with his hands was evidently good, because the air caught in Malfoy’s throat, cutting him off midway through a breath, and now he was struggling to keep his eyes on Tom’s own. Tom didn’t stop though. He didn’t stop until Malfoy tilted his head back, his neck creasing and his brow furrowed and his teeth threatening to go straight through his lip.  
“You’re – you’re not – playing fair,” Malfoy practically groaned.  
“ _Aren’t I?_ ” said Tom with a smile, as he raised one of his hands to Malfoy’s chin and gripping it tight enough to leave imprints on the skin.  
“Aren’t I?” he repeated, forcing Malfoy to drop his head and look at him.  
“I don’t think fairness comes into it, Abraxas. You see, I rather think this is _all_ about your own insatiability. Because…”  
Tom took the opportunity to dip his hands again and seemed to smirk when Malfoy’s hips stuttered involuntarily forward in response.  
“…Even after everything I’ve _already_ done for you, you still want more, don’t you?” Tom murmured, his mouth on the very edge of Malfoy’s jaw.  
Malfoy himself just stared like a lost puppy, lips parted and that faint flush darkening to a shameful shade. He could have easily seen Harry watching if he’d just looked over, but Malfoy was much too focussed on drowning in Tom’s eyes to even care if someone else was watching. 

“You – you – love it,” Malfoy mumbled, the words all sticking in his throat; they should have been sweet say, but now they were almost sickly, sticking to him like candyfloss sticks in the grass.  
Tom just smiled again. Harry could see it, reflected back at him in all its diamond glory.  
“Oh, I most certainly do, and you know what else I love about you?”  
Malfoy shook his head.  
“I love your _willingness_ to indulge me, Abraxas.”  
If Malfoy could, he would have rolled his eyes, instead, he merely shut them, squeezed them tightly shut like he was doing his utmost to concentrate on something that wasn’t Tom.  
“What – what do you – want?” he said, taking so many gasps of air so quick that Harry would have thought his world must be starting to pulse and spin.  
“Just the usual.”  
Before Harry could wonder what the ‘usual’ consisted of, Malfoy was answering the question he hadn’t yet asked.  
“How much?” he said, still not opening his eyes.  
“As much as you can give me.”  
Malfoy sucked a breath between his teeth.  
“G-give me a number.”  
“Forty – no, fifty,” Tom said, leaning forward to mouth softly at Malfoy’s neck  
“Christ, Riddle.”  
Another gulp of air into his lungs.  
“I – I mean – ” he groaned, “it’s – it’s in my – wallet”  
Tom smiled, and leaned across the sofa, grabbing Malfoy’s jacket from the arm. With both hands poignantly _not_ touching Malfoy he began to search through the pockets. It was the third one before he found the rather large brown wallet. Still not touching him, Tom opened it, taking his time to slide his fingers over the leather, to dip them into the pockets and swirling his thumb over the zip in way that made Harry’s throat feel too tight for reasons he didn’t want to think about, much less explain.  
Tom must have been satisfied with the notes he found though because he put the jacket down and smiled again.  
“I hope you realise how much I _value_ your contribution, Abraxas, because I do; I do _ever_ so much.”

Harry continued to watch in pained silence, his shoulder digging into the corner of the doorframe, as Tom hooked his hand around the back of Malfoy’s neck, pulling him forward and murmuring something he couldn’t hear. Malfoy clearly could though, and that flush trickled further down his neck, but he still smiled. He still kissed Tom’s mouth when it was offered and still mumbled words that all blurred together into Tom’s ear.  
Tom just pulled away, that warmth that held all the power in the world painted across his face.  
“Well, if you want to show your gratitude, I won’t stop you,” he said, his hand staying firmly on the back of Malfoy’s neck.  
Malfoy’s next action made Harry’s stomach turned over itself. It was a strange feeling of anticipation and anxiety that seeped through every vein as Malfoy slid down onto his knees, his eyes, along with Harry’s, never leaving Tom.  
Without quite knowing why Harry was sure of what was about to happen before him. It was the natural conclusion of things. He’d always known it, somewhere inside his stomach; this is what they did together. _This_ was what all those stares across the room, and all those moments of speaking low, and all those fingers touching, and all those moments when everything was touching, meant. What made it so much worse was that he had wanted this to be the conclusion. He had wanted so much for it to be real, for Tom to just possibly like _him_ in that way, but a bit of him hadn’t wanted to believe it; he hadn’t wanted to see the things that Tom let Malfoy do to him, but now he was watching; every part of him too hot and too tight, just a knot being pulled tauter and tauter until there was no hope in ever getting it undone. 

Despite the fact Harry would never proclaim to be an expert on love, after all, he didn’t know much about relationships, what they were supposed to look like, or feel like, that was all alien to him, there was still something _off_ about the way Malfoy looked so demure, so utterly passive. The way that he ran his fingers along Tom’s leg as though he were made of marble and to touch anymore would damage him irreparably. It was wrong, though Harry couldn’t say why. Perhaps, it was the grip of Tom’s hand on the back of his neck. Harry could see it in the mirror, the knuckles white, and Malfoy’s skin going even paler around the outline. Or perhaps it was his smile, pretty and spread so wide, but also so cold, almost hollow. Harry didn’t think love was supposed to be so empty.  
Not that thinking that stopped his mouth turning to a desert, and his palms practically becoming springs they were so damp, and all because he _shouldn’t_ be watching, but he couldn’t help but stare. It was so mesmeric watching Malfoy kiss the tips of Tom’s fingers, so compulsive in seeing the flickers of his tongue lapping away the last threads of tension from Tom’s shoulders, so completely hypnotic in watching.  
Even when Malfoy’s body completely obscured what was happening from the mirror’s gaze, there was still an urge left behind, an impossible magnetism that stuck his eyes to Tom’s reflection and made him keep watching even when he really shouldn’t have.  
But then, the longer he watched the more artificial the scene started to be. The glamour of it all was fading, the shining newness was starting to dim and the reality that it was just two people doing something that was illegal started to ooze into the room like an uninvited guest does into a conversation. Behind the thrill and the opulence, it was all so crafted, staged and directed so perfectly; the intimacy was real, but the feelings behind it all felt forced, as though Tom had decided to put on a play, dressed the set to the nines, and then hired only amateurs to act. As he watched from his place in the corner, Harry couldn’t help but think that Tom had wanted him to see, that he had engineered this entire scenario just to show him something.

Though what that something was, Harry couldn’t guess. He did not need to witness such an _obvious_ display to see what Tom was. The control, the sheer force of his personality did not need a stage and script and lights to be seen, it was there everywhere, all the time. His entire life was a performance so meticulously choreographed that it hardly seemed to be real. Compared that, this was so clumsy, perhaps even crude. Obvious to the nth degree. But there was hardly time to judge, not when Tom was dipping his fingers into Malfoy’s hair, twirling a strand around his finger, and letting it run off again rather like how water runs off duck feathers. Not when he started to coil his hair tighter and stopped letting go. Though he couldn’t ever see properly, the mirror made sure of that.  
But Harry didn’t need to _see_ to _know_ what they were doing. He’d heard enough conversations he wasn’t supposed to, to know the mechanics of human bodies. He’d seen the girl with the red jumper and her not-boyfriend in the bathroom at the far end of the classics department, the one that no one ever used. He knew what the tightness in Malfoy’s back and the shifts of his neck meant. The only thing he didn’t know was what it felt like, but even that he could imagine.  
In the mirror he could see Tom’s every reaction; from the faint flush spiralling down his neck, to the press of his heel on the base of Malfoy’s spine, and he could almost _feel_ it. The firmness of Tom’s shoe and the heat of his fingers on his scalp.  
However inappropriate it was, Harry couldn’t deny the sharpness in his stomach, like someone pressing bits of glass in between his ribs. They hurt, but not as much as the throb in his groin. If he’d been hidden away, really hidden, Harry wouldn’t have thought twice about pressing himself against the doorframe. Feeling the solidness of it. Knowing it was a constant, durable, tangible thing that he could hold, squeeze, crush between his fingers as he bit into his thumb and pretend that that would sate this hunger inside of him, even when he knew it wouldn’t.  
He was so busy thinking of things that he would do if he was alone that Harry did not catch the exact moment that Tom looked up. All he knew was that, suddenly, Tom’s reflection was staring at the dark corner of the doorway, staring at the just the right height to see his features highlighted.  
Immediately, Harry retreated, dipped himself back into the black shadows that now seemed like a refuge.  
Tom’s reflection just smiled. And there was such a gorgeous laziness to that smile, others might have mistaken it for carelessness, but it wasn’t. This was something much more authoritative; confidence taking to its absolute edge, so close to arrogance, that if Tom’s smile had spread that little bit wider, he would reach it. But it didn’t, and so he did not seem conceited with his own achievements.  
_I see you standing there._  
That was what that smile seemed to say.  
_I see you, Harry._  
He should have stopped watching then and there. He should have stopped and walked away and hoped that Tom wouldn’t mind, but he didn’t. He stayed, so completely still; just watching Tom watch him, and wishing more than ever that he was in Malfoy’s place.


	8. respondeat superior

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologise for this being a little shorter and more self-indulgent than usual.

Harry stumbled back, trying each and every door, ignoring the way that his breath caught heavy in his throat and how everything was either too dry or too damp; until he found the one with all the others. They were still all there, exactly how he had left them, though the music had changed, something old and French now crooned through the room; a sultry voice that sounded like a hand too low on his back threaded itself between the walls, interrupted only the slow bubbles of conversation. None of them acted like they’d cared that he’d been gone for so long, and Harry wasn’t sure whether that was a blessing or a curse.  
Avery looked like he was asleep, draped across almost the entire sofa, his fingers brushing the floor. Druella and Rosier were still too close together, an unmoving, grotesque, eldritch being that was incomprehensible to the human eye. The only reason he didn’t think they were statutes, strange replacements for his friends, was the smudge of Druella’s lipstick, the large mark in the middle of her lips where it had been spread thin, like she had smacked her lips together too many times or someone had kissed her right in the centre of her mouth.  
He passed his eyes further to where Lestrange and Aloysius were still together, the latter had now spread himself over Lestrange’s lap, and seemed to be contented as Lestrange’s fingers absently stroked the fur on his belly. Just spreading the fur out and pressing lightly into the skin in tiny little circles that made Aloysius stretch out even further.  
As he watched, Harry couldn’t help but think of the way that Tom’s hands touched Malfoy’s cheek, of how his fingers traced an invisible line down Malfoy’s shoulder, how they caught on every button of his shirt and just how Malfoy had rolled his neck, let every part of him become unstrung, and –  
“Harry?”  
He looked up.  
Rosier was watching him, “are you alright?” he asked.  
There was a concern in his eyes, but it was clouded and hazed, enough that Harry could tell this was merely Rosier being a good host and not any sort of attempt at intervention in his feelings. If he had seen what was happening, he wasn’t planning on persuading or dissuading him from either path.  
So, he nodded.  
“Yeah, I’m – I’m fine,” he said, the words sticking in his mouth and clogging up his throat. It didn’t sound convincing, even to Harry’s own ears, but it appeared to satisfy Rosier, who sat back, his head tipped up to stare at the ceiling, and his sister’s fingers stroking the nape of his neck.

If, in the next quarter of an hour, any of them asked him a question, or more than one, Harry didn’t hear them. All he could hear was his heartbeat. The pounding of his pulse under his skin, it seemed to beat so hard that if he peeled back his shirt then he would see the skin rise and fall. And then there was the sound. It resonated through his head and out the other side; apparently coming out of every orifice in the room. Harry could hear it echoing around the chimney and down the line of ornamental china across the room, he could hear it spilling from each of their mouths and sliding through the keyhole. And it wrapped itself around him, burrowing down into every crease of his brain, spreading like a disease, until, it was the only thing he could think about. It was embarrassing. Mortifying even, to know that the sleekness of Tom’s smile was all it took for him to come apart at the seams like some poorly made toy. He didn’t even know _him_ , for god’s sake. They’d barely talked, but Harry wanted nothing more than to lie with Tom. To speak and listen with him, to touch and kiss him. To feel Tom’s hands in his hair, and to run his own through Tom’s.  
Unlike everything and everyone in this city, Tom did not make him want to cower; Tom’s presence did not make him recoil to that small, empty box that he had made himself for such purposes. Tom did not make him want to be _safe_. Rather, when Tom had smiled at him in the mirror, as sharp as a shard of glass, Harry had felt the slightest stirring of defiance. A need to keep standing, to keep watching, even when he _knew_ he shouldn’t. What was perhaps stranger though, was how much he _liked_ that slow twisting in the base of his stomach; that pressing inside him, like a corkscrew pushing into a cork and screwing down ever so deep.

It was not a thought that should have appealed to anyone, but least of all him. He was ordinary. He did not have strange perversions, except now he did, and they were decorated with Tom’s name. And it was horrible, in that gorgeous sort of way. A spike in his blood that ran all the way through his body, the sort of feeling Harry imagined you felt when someone impaled you; the sharpness of the pike pressing right through the stomach, up along the full lengths of the spine, and straight through the back of the neck. _Gorgeous_ , in a horrible sort of way.  
Harry felt that jolt every single time he thought of Tom with his head lazily leaned against the ridge of the sofa, his eyes never leaving that black space where Harry stood, even as his heel pressed harder into Malfoy’s spine, and his chest was rising and falling faster than it had done before.  
Harry tried to close his eyes, to take a moment. Breathe, though Harry could hardly remember how to do that. Everything was too stuttered, from his hands continually fidgeting in his lap to the tapping of his feet on the floor, even the oxygen seemed to stammer through his lungs, making black spots blink prettily before his eyes.  
And everywhere there wasn’t blackness, there was Tom. Tom’s mouth kissing Malfoy’s, Tom’s lips, the curve of his smile, the clench of his hands, and the faint bob of his throat as he swallowed. If Harry could have denied that he wanted to kiss Tom before, he certainly couldn’t now. Not when the thought was clouding out everything else in the world, rising like a behemoth from the depths to scrape the stars and block out the sun.  
That ache was ever-present, a dull throb at the back of his lungs, so much so that it almost hurt to breathe. Before now, the thought of touching Tom’s hands to his lips had seemed like the most salacious thing in the entire world, but now, that innocent little thought was dwarfed by the endlessness of the void that had taken its place. That huge emptiness which sucked all it came across inside him until he was so full with feelings that he swore it must be spilling out across the floor, staining into the carpet, and revealing what he longed for, to anyone who cared to look. 

He was still thinking of that aching hole inside him, like a cigarette stubbed out on fabric, that Tom’s smile had put there, when Malfoy reappeared, alone.  
His appearance was immaculate; buttons all done up; hair tied back, quite simply, not a hair out of place. He was clutching a glass of water. And it seemed almost ridiculous. After all, they all must all know that what he performed so meticulously was nothing more than a hollow fallacy. It was ingrained in the way Avery sighed and pressed himself further into the back of the sofa, ingrained in the smile Lestrange flashed him, and ingrained in the words that Druella mouthed but Harry couldn’t understand.  
All of them knew, but they pretended that they didn’t. They kept their gazes low and their opinions to themselves. Whatever Tom did with his spare time was not theirs to gossip about, and so they didn’t, like well-trained dogs they did not touch the meat in front of them without permission.  
Even Malfoy himself just sat down next to Lestrange and began to pet Aloysius like nothing had happened; like he hadn’t just spent the last hour alone with Tom; like they hadn’t been… Harry didn’t dare to think of it, for fear the spikes in his stomach might return from their momentary hiatus.  
Fortunately, Harry didn’t have to say anything, for Lestrange did just that; they spoke as though they were merely resuming a conversation after a minute-long break, as though Malfoy had gone out for a cigarette and nothing more.  
He continued to watch them, but not listen. For once, he didn’t want to hear what they had to say. Harry didn’t _need_ to hear their pretty ideas anymore to know they were pretty, so he just watched their tongues and their fingers and the edges of their teeth, and he wondered what it would be like to touch them. To feel other people’s fingers against his own, to know what the bite of their teeth felt like on his lips, and what the very tip of their tongue would taste like inside his mouth.  
Even as the memories were flowing between the music and muffles of conversations he didn’t care to hear, Harry couldn’t remember any time that he had felt like this before. Not like _this_. Although he couldn’t deny he liked to watch the girl in his Criminal Law lectures, the one with the red hair, he didn’t want her to devour him the way he wanted these people to. He wanted to walk with her in the park on Sundays like any good boy should want to do with a good girl. But he didn’t want to do that with Tom. No, with Tom he wanted to be selfish, he wanted to be cruel, he wanted to take whatever he wanted and consume it. 

Harry swallowed and blinked a couple of times, taking in the room again, as though it were new. But the only thing that had changed was Aloysius, who Malfoy had, somehow, managed to coax from Lestrange’s lap into his own, and he was purring so loudly that even Harry could hear from the other side of the room. Lestrange wasn’t happy about it, and he looked as though he might go as far as to argue the matter, but the door’s creaking interrupted his plans.  
Tom did not have a glass of water when he came back, nor did he have any other pretences to disguise what he had been doing with his time, but nor were there any obvious signs. As much as Harry raked his eyes over him, he could see nothing out of the ordinary, nothing _out of place_. Tom looked as though he had just arrived, still fresh from the cool air of the night, and not wearied as all the others were by hotness and music and alcohol and affluence. Instead, he stood there, the single thriving flower in a wilting vase.  
None of the others paid any particular attention to him, not deliberately avoiding his eye, merely not acknowledging them, through a mixture of lethargy and indifference. It was late. They were all probably tired, Harry knew he should be too, but as he caught Tom glancing at him, he didn’t have time to be tired, and this feeling of wakefulness only intensified when Tom began to walk toward him.  
He stood in front of Harry’s sofa, though he was only occupying the smallest corner, for almost a minute before Avery got the hint. He rolled off, neither elegantly, nor quietly and glared at Tom. Harry could feel the tension in the room they stood watching each other, Avery’s chin tilted up, his ego still apparently suffering from being brought to its knees earlier in the evening.  
Tom just side-stepped him and sat down, his own chin raised, until Avery got the message to go and sit on the floor.  
That would have been the end of it, had Tom not sat entirely too close to Harry for it to be accidental. To make matters worse, Tom draped one arm over the back of the chair, and he sat with his right ankle balanced on his left knee. It was a position that was entirely too comfortable, too indulgent; and he knew just how good it made him look. How completely in control he was, commanding the room as though he were its conductor, or its artist, with absolute jurisdiction over every, single, brushstroke.  
Although Harry had been grasping at straws with his descriptions of Tom, clasping at the little snippets he saw of the man behind that mask of utter immaculation, Harry now saw that he had been right. Maybe that should have scared him, maybe, he should have pulled back, dragged himself away from the burning light that could only be a sign of danger; maybe that was what he should have done, but tonight, Harry could not resist the flames. 

So, when Tom turned to him with the dazzling smile that held secrets between its teeth, Harry turned his head as well. For a moment they looked at each other, sharing the same glance that they had done all evening, the one that made Tom into an octopus with tentacles that curled and squeezed around Harry’s heart until its beating slowed and his breath ran out.  
“You know, Harry,” Tom said, his head to the side, “we haven’t spoken much tonight.”  
Although it was a casual remark, Harry couldn’t help but read it as a rebuke, not to him, but the world, for not giving them the opportunity to have collided. Somehow, that statement was at odds with the tone in which he delivered it. For whilst the words were meaningless, the quality of their delivery was most certainly not. The tenor of those words was quiet, intimate, and far more alluring than they had any right to be; rather like they were spies sharing secrets in dark corners of a café, and not just sitting on a sofa, late at night, surrounded by friends who did not look at them.  
“I – I supposed not,” Harry replied, turning his head back across the room, and trying not to focus on how the words jumbled themselves together before they even hit his tongue.  
Tom continued to smile; Harry’s own uneasiness was apparently entertaining him for there was a flicker in his eye. The same one he’d had when watching him hide in the darkest of corners.  
“There’s no need to be so nervous, Harry, I already told you, I don’t bite.”  
Though he said it whilst looking like he _very_ much wanted to take a bite, and Harry _had_ to think of Malfoy’s words, murmured, only hour or so before.  
_I see how much you want him._  
Tom was certainly _wanting_ , but for exactly what, Harry couldn’t say. If he was pressed, he’d have said Tom wanted to eat him, roll him on his tongue like he did his name; lick him off his fingers and swallow him. But it was all probably the dimness of the light and the intensity of the heat that was starting to creep back into his bones. Harry would put up with all that forever though, if, he was simply allowed to be a star, and Tom was the constant sky, swallowing him up in the ever endless black. Then, he’d let him lick at his fingers, kiss them and consume them. Right now, he might let Tom consume his very heart, if he asked. He didn’t ask.  
The only thing that Tom _did_ do, was lean forward, only a fraction, but enough that he could smooth an unruly curl of hair back behind his ear. Harry’s lungs turned to stone, and he felt himself inhale too sharply, to make up for it.  
Tom let out a little laugh and le his fingers continue their course down behind his ear, detaching themselves just before they touched Harry’s neck. Then he did it again. Two fingers pressing into his hair, nails skimming over his scalp.  
As those fingers grew bolder, Harry couldn’t even bring himself to look directly at Tom. He just stared across the room, watching Malfoy’s hands as he petted Aloysius.

It was several minutes of complete silence, punctuated only by the sounds of his hair being smoothed down so close to his ear before Harry brought himself to turn and face Tom. He didn’t regret it.  
Tom was just… watching him; his tongue wetting his lip, and the flicker of his teeth not far behind. If Harry wasn’t mistaken, he would have said Tom was peeling back his layers with his eyes alone, digging right down between the folds made of his past and his present, his emotions and his fears, every little thing that he loved or loathed, Tom saw in such intimate detail; and still his fingers continued their caresses.  
Though, to credit him, Tom seemed to pick up on the tension that had strung itself through Harry’s shoulders, like a plant that suddenly required a cane to grow straight.  
“Do you not like being touched, Harry?” he murmured, his fingers stopping and retracting just enough that they no longer touched a single part of him.  
Harry didn’t say anything, he didn’t know what he was supposed to say, after all, being touched felt uncomfortable, embarrassing and awkward, but… but it also felt nice. Safe.  
“Or perhaps, you’ve just never been touched like this, to know if you like it?”  
Tom said it as a question, even if it sounded like a statement, and Harry found himself nodding, and Tom’s fingers began to curl back into his hair, apparently not caring at all that more than one person was watching. Harry could feel Druella’s gaze, not accusatory, only intrigued, heavy on him. He didn’t want to look up at her. He didn’t want to see what she thought of him.  
“I’d love to talk to you more,” said Tom conversationally, as though he wasn’t stroking his hair, as though he wasn’t leaning close enough that Harry could feel the warmth of his body, as though this was a completely normal thing to do with your friends, late into the night. Perhaps it was. Harry had never had enough friends to know.  
“Next Sunday, at eleven, perhaps?” continued Tom, undeterred by anyone watching him.  
_That_ got Druella’s full attention.  
“Sunday?” she said, her eyebrow raised and her tone, questioning.  
“There’s nothing wrong with that, is there?”  
“It’s a Sunday, Riddle.”  
“Just because you’re busy wasting your time at the same hour every week, doesn’t mean I have to, as you well know.”  
His tone was cold, a single strip of ice through glowing embers, and Druella didn’t bother to argue with him, she just threw her hands up in surrender, and Tom continued to touch his hair.  
“So, would you like to talk next Sunday?”  
“Yes,” Harry heard himself reply in an impossibly tiny voice that only made Tom’s smile wider. 

Harry was only half awake. He didn’t remember falling asleep, but no one does, do they? And even now that he was awake, he did not feel it. Before his eyes, the world was glazed, glassy and distant like he was watching it all through dimmed down panes of coloured glass. His glasses did not make a difference, it was the world itself that was glossed over.  
Though, his tainted vision could not disguise the simple alterations that had taken place in the fabric of the room, the most obvious being that Rosier and Druella had disappeared. Their place sat decidedly empty across the room. No one else had attempted to fill it, and Harry wondered whether they were coming back.  
When they did instantly, he passed his gaze across the room: Lestrange was taking up most of the opposite sofa, with Malfoy curled up on the corner, apparently asleep. Aloysius was beside him, also asleep, though every so often his tail flicked wildly, and his whole body twitched. It was probably a dream. This whole world felt like a dream. A lovely hazy dream that would be snatched away by the morning. Harry wished it wasn’t a dream, that this was reality from now on. Lying with these people, talking and laughing with them, just _being_ one of them.  
He blinked again, his eyes following the light trails to the fireplace. Avery was on the floor by the fire, prodding it with a poker, beside him sat Tom. For once, they did not appear to be arguing, and Harry could see again that genuineness that he had seen in the library. That thing, he would have then called concern, but now would have called interest that Tom placed upon Avery.  
They were talking, murmuring really, all hushed voices and pretend secrets. The two of them looked strangely domestic sitting there together, more like siblings than lovers though, simply two people, smiling at one another in the glow of the flames. Smiling and touching, Tom’s friendly hand on Avery’s shoulder in a display that Harry would have labelled with reassurance and understanding, like what older siblings are supposed to provide to their youngers, and how friends that grew up alone have learnt to provide support.  
But whatever motivation lay behind Tom’s actions, Avery appeared to appreciate it. For, although, their conversation was inaudible, no one could mistake the way that Avery smiled, how he basked in the attention that Tom had given him, placing him centre stage; apparently forgiving all their animosity tonight. Though, if Harry was not mistaken, and he might have been, Tom’s nods were nothing more than mechanical. The smiles and the words as empty as the glasses on the table and completely substanceless. What was before him, was an empty stage, the set hanging high, but the actor absent. Avery had no more than Tom’s superficial attention, not that he seemed to notice at all, he was much too involved in smiling to notice that Tom didn’t appear to care. 

Harry’s eyes open again later, the fire had died down to an ember, and most of the lights were off. Lestrange had shifted and Avery was now lying between him and Malfoy. Harry turned slowly, everything was fuzzy before his eyes, dark shapes seemed to move, seemed to dance in the corners and encroach on the light. There were a thousand monsters creeping into the light, flickering and trembling, scared to take what they wanted but ever so persistent. Those monsters were beautiful, in a way. Hidden to the world, only coming out when they deigned it to be appropriate, when they felt they were safe to climb between the shafts of light without being seen, just so beautiful. Harry felt his eyelids closing again, the sweet seduction of sleep too tempting to resist. But a strange warmth beside him stopped him from sleeping.  
Perhaps the unknown nature of it all should have scared him, but Harry could not find it in him to be scared, even in this dark; so dark that it shrouded everything in black, even the warmth of what must have been a body beside him was caressed by the monsters of the dark, to the extent that he could not even see their face. Harry still tried though, turning his head a little, squinting into the dark and seeing nothing but black shadow after black shadow.  
“Don’t be scared,” came a murmur from the warm shape that he was resting his head on. The voice was soothing, reassuring, even when it shouldn’t have been, just cosy and soft and safe.  
“It’s only me,” said the voice again, closer this time, and though Harry’s head was filled with fog, he remembered the tone, the sound. It was Tom speaking in the dark. Speaking to him, for all the others were asleep across the room. Though Harry looked, though he peered and glanced through the dark, he couldn’t make out Tom’s features; he was far too blurred with the darkness, and now the two were inseparable. All that he could feel was the faintness of Tom’s breathing and what he assumed was the gentlest brush of his fingers down Harry’s own back.  
“Are you awake, Harry?” Tom said quietly.  
Harry knew then that he truly must have been lying against Tom. Asleep on his shoulder or maybe his chest, at least, close enough for Tom to have been smoothing his fingers through his hair for quite a while. Just the very tips, so careful, soothing; from the top of his head, down through his hair, over the ridge of his neck, and finally, tracing his shoulder blades.  
There was silence for a moment when Harry did not move, and Tom did not say anything. A lovely, simple, stillness, before Tom’s fingers began to climb again. They dipped into Harry’s hair, stroking it ever so slowly.  
“I know you’re awake,” Tom murmured, still drawing those sweet little circles that should have been sending Harry to sleep, but rather, felt like pinpricks digging into his skin, waking him more with each and every touch.  
“There was something we couldn’t talk about earlier,” he paused long enough for Harry to hear his heart pound like a beacon through the room.  
“I know you were watching,” Tom said slowly, his mouth suddenly so close that Harry could feel the heat of his tongue, “all I want to know, Harry, is, did you like what you saw?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's very late here, and whilst I've given this a once-over, I'll give it a better look tomorrow, so please excuse any typos.


	9. modus operandi

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, a slight change of plan. This was supposed to be a much more extensive chapter, but when it was only a third written, it was already pushing twenty thousand words, and my sister convinced me to split it up, (even now it's over fifteen thousand words (sorry)). So, now, to accommodate, there are four additional chapters to this fic.
> 
> I hope this isn't too irritating (or too long), and, as always, thank you for being so patient between updates.

Tom said nothing about what he did. Not for the rest of that night, nor the following morning when Druella woke Harry early and showed him to the door. In fact, Druella was the only one he properly saw that morning.  
She dressed up nice, softer and sweeter than the night before; if last night she had been a starling with glittering feather that suggested something brutal inside her heart, now, she was a blue tit, as delicate as the dawn light on the closed curtains, as though if they were opened she would fade away.  
But, however, she looked, she still smiled the same. The glimmer of that excitement slithering beneath her tongue  
“I am sorry we can’t take you home, but it’s All Saint’s Day, and we all have our commitments, unfortunately,” she explained as they walked through that maze of a house, though it was hardly a maze at all to her. She turned every corner with confidence, the flow of her white dress making her seem like a ghost haunting the walls.  
Harry had nodded as she spoke, he didn’t really feel up to doing much more than that. There was a throbbing in the back of his head, like last night’s but so much worse. If he had had to put a description to it, he would have said someone was screwing nails into the back of his head. And it wasn’t pleasant. Quite the opposite and he just wanted to lie in bed, or, if the option had been available, continue to lie on the sofa in the dark with Tom’s hands in his hair and words he couldn’t even hear whispered into his ear.

Druella showed him all the way to the door and even outside of it into the coldness that could only be November. The sudden chill that infected every inch of the air, turning it from the substanceless nothing, into something so liquidy, it was like the sea had switched places with the sky.  
Harry had honestly expected to just be abandoned on the doorstep, smiled at, waved at, and then left to do as he wished. But Druella’s hand stayed firm on the small of his back, and she guided him right up the path and through the black rail gate.  
On the other side was a car; a sleek, white, thing of the type that Harry saw but had never been that close to before. They belonged to a different world.  
“He’ll take you wherever you want to go,” Druella said, “until next time, Potter.”  
He nodded again and watched as she turned and walked back to the house, closing the door behind her.  
In the back of his head, Harry knew he should go, that his welcome was over, and now it was time to return to reality. Forever waiting on the edge of his seat for the moment he was invited back into their world. Into Tom’s world.  
He sighed and looked one last time at the house, its tall, white façade looking back at him. Almost mocking the fact that he was unlikely to return any time soon.  
Harry was just about to turn back to the car and leave when something caught his eye. Something or rather, someone, sitting on the window seat on first-floor, left-hand window.  
They were dipped in the shadows enough that he wouldn’t have seen them unless he had been looking carefully at the house. And despite not knowing for sure who it was, Harry still felt he knew. It had to be Tom. Tom sitting there with one leg bent at the knee, the other Harry couldn’t see, but suppose it must be stretched out, running the length of the window. His head back against the wall but there was no denying he was looking out, and not just across the way, but down, specifically, at the street.  
The details of him were all blurred out by the gloom, but Harry could still see the blocks of colour: the white of his shirt, still undone at the top, the darkness of his hair smudging with the shadows and the edge of his smile cutting through everything like a diamond through glass.  
Harry swallowed and stared, trying to remember how exactly his lungs managed to get air into them for they were straining. He could feel them pulsing, practically another heartbeat under his ribs, threatening to break right through his skin and make a heart-shaped hole in his chest, that burned at the edges. Even out here in the cold, he felt too hot like he was standing on embers that charred his feet.  
Through the dim of the pane, Harry could only just see the sliver of white that was Tom’s raising up in the motion of a wave, and with it, a great lump rose in Harry’s throat as though he had swallowed a searing stone. And, before he could stop himself, he too was raising his hand, and wishing, more than anything to feel Tom’s palm against his own, to remove this unspeakable distance between them and just have Tom touch him when no one was watching. 

But instead, Harry went home. There was nowhere else he wanted to be because there was no way he could be with _them_. Anyway, he had work to do, how else was he supposed to maintain his scholarship if he spent every waking moment thinking about what _they_ were doing, or, more specifically, what Tom was doing.  
It wasn’t, Harry thought as he sat in the car and watched the city cruise past, that he didn’t care about the others; they were warm and friendly and intelligent and brilliant. They were everything he had ever wanted to be and nothing that he was, and just the fact that they were willing to spend a few minutes of their day with him would have made his decade. But them willing to be with him for an entire evening, and a promise from Tom of another hook-up on Sunday was overwhelming. Though, perhaps he shouldn’t call it a hook-up, because it wasn’t anything… indecent. _Except it was, wasn’t it?_ said a voice so insidiously inside his head; it was outrageously _indecent_.  
It didn’t really matter, all that did, was this feeling of excitement, electricity even, like sticking his fingers in an electric socket over and over again just to feel the thrill threading its way through every muscle. Being with them, being with Tom was an escape from this drab little world that he’d always lived in, and the fact that they _wanted_ him there, well, it all just felt so magical, like fate had a new dress and was swishing it for all to see.  
In the car, it was cool, everything was cool, and Harry could see the colours of morning diffusing out across the sky. Right now, though they were far too bright on his eyes, worming their way into his head just to pound. And even when Harry leant back into the leather, feeling its chill under his fingers, there was still the heat from last night on the back of his neck.  
Tom’s hand resting firmly, leaving a warmth behind that burned his fingerprints into Harry’s body. They were everywhere, a beautiful infection that he knew he’d never be able to get out, and one that he never wanted to.  
Harry have never thought he’d be one of _those_ people. The silly boys and girls that fell in love in the blink of an eye and could never bear to be apart from their beloved. Those sorts of people were sweet from a distance and irritating close up, but he wasn’t one of them, he’d never been one of them. But, then again, he’d never been one of anything before. 

Arriving back at his own room, Harry could help but see how small and dingy it really was. Even though the curtains in _their_ great rooms had been drawn across, and any daylight that could have got in was prohibited, the spaces still felt airy, beautiful, practically angelic. The freshness had been something that Harry could taste on the very tip of his tongue, a sort of tingle that spoke of wealth and privilege and general entitlement.  
The only taste he had on his tongue now, was the flavour of damp. Probably mould, though he didn’t know where it came from; it was more of an aura, a permanent presence that clouded over him as cumulonimbus might a small town. It bit at his tongue like poverty, as harsh and discernible as the smell of burning sugar, impossible to get away from now that he had experienced a time where it wasn’t there.  
He wasn’t jealous per se, as he sat down on the bed and stared at the blank walls; more envious, there was no way Harry could deny that he didn’t want what they had; that grace and that sophistication and that friendship and that money. Especially the money.  
Maybe, it was just because that would be the ticket, the key, that would open up all the doors to their opulent world, or, maybe, it was because that would get Tom’s attention. Properly.  
Money would get Tom’s mouth on his, Tom’s fingers back in his hair and his pretty, pretty words whispered in his ear. All because Tom wasn’t rich, not by birth at least, or, not to the extent that Malfoy was, that any of them were really. But Tom didn’t _need_ to be born wealthy, not when he had that sleek smile and a charm that wrapped around anyone’s neck like a snake. He could get whatever he wanted just by asking, and Harry would give him anything, _anything_ he had if Tom wanted it.  
People would say that it wouldn’t mean anything like that, but Harry didn’t need it to mean anything, he’d like it to, but if the best he was ever going to get was Tom’s hands on his waist because he spared him as much money as he wanted, then it didn’t matter, Harry would take it. 

Despite the ache right in the back of his head, like someone was pressing on it with a scalpel, Harry tried to work on those essays for the rest of the day: the consideration of contracts, criminalisation of mere offences, the Rule of law, but it wasn’t working. He couldn’t help it, there was just such a distraction hovering over him. Just sitting here, alongside him and his books, was an agitation that got the better of him when he was reading and reading and reading. It only grew bigger as he watched the world come into focus with every paragraph; that distinct clarity that could only be achieved with knowledge was spreading out, filling in the blanks of the map, but the angle was off. And the whole experience, well, it all felt flat.  
This understanding was so hollow, so fake. He might now know how the world worked but that just meant there was a little more of it to disappoint him, and whenever the law abandoned him, Harry was flailing in the dark. Gripping randomly to the only other thing he could remember: Tom’s words pressing harder on the forefront of his mind.  
It hurt, not Tom’s words, but the law’s emptiness because the law had always been that constant, the never-changing steadiness in his life. It had parameters, boundaries, edges; there was less confusion inside that little box, or, at least, there used to be. Now though, Harry was having second thoughts. Third thoughts. Fourth thoughts.  
And the more thoughts he had; the more Tom seemed to blend into all of them. He bled out between the lines of the page, between even the letters of the words, staining them with his smile and his opinions. Those awfully attractive opinions. Of course, they were wrong, very wrong; attractive in an intellectual sense only, but then again…  
Harry sighed and put down his pen. The more he looked at these books and these essays, the more he could see what Tom was talking about. In contracts and constitutions and criminal justice, there was always this undercurrent of passion and control and deception. Everything he’d so staunchly denied was present within their legal system, seemed to lurk just beneath the surface like those sharp rocks that cut your feet at the beach; they waited below the rolling waves invisible to everyone but those who plunged right in. And every academic in the field appeared to have a code of conduct, an agreement not to reveal all the nasty things about the law that no one knew.  
No one saw that there were things inside the law that were rotten. That this thing people put all their faith in was a festering infection in a wound that they thought was healed but _really_ wasn’t.  
For contracts were not designed to be friendly, they were not made to be fair or nice, inside them was this putrid heart, forcing you to sign away your life for little or no choice at all. Having to watch your value, as a person, as a worker, as an _anything_ , be reduced to mere words, mere expressions of what this _entity_ thought you were worth.  
When it came to criminal justice, there was no more obvious injustice than the men and women who were still hung for crimes they did or did not commit; that was surely control, in its most glittering form? And if the law was poisoned with control, then who was to say it was free of all the other evils that Harry had always entertained as impossible.

Harry did not get long to think about it alone, as the next day he was back in lectures. Back to the mundane routines of waking and walking and listening and learning. All without the added comfort of seeing any of them, because, now that they were friends in the very loosest sense of the word, he couldn’t stalk them.  
What made their absence worse though, was how people’s eyes were heavy on him in every classroom that he walked into. Suddenly, people were noticing him, they still weren’t acknowledging him, but they _were_ seeing. They were paying attention to him for the first time since they’d all arrived.  
Multiple times Harry had to look down and check that there weren’t great stains on his shirt or rips in his trousers. There weren’t but people still watched. Each stare was uncomfortable, too hot on Harry’s skin, too tight like being constantly pinged with elastic, and he didn’t really know _why_.  
Sure, he’d spent some time with the ones that everyone wanted a piece of, but that didn’t _mean_ anything. He was still on the edge of being a nobody and a nothing, hardly secured in his newfound riches, no matter that everyone seemed to think that _he_ had something they didn’t.

He was musing on the fact in his contract law class, listening but not particularly paying attention to the drifting sounds of the professor’s voice as it curled around the syllables, taking far too long at each and every one word until half the class were asleep.  
The ones who weren’t were watching Harry; he could feel their eyes on his fingers and the back of his head, trying to dig holes right into his brain. He ignored them. Harry ignored everything and continued to watch out the window at the small blue tit that flitted between the windowpanes, occasionally landing on the sill just outside the window he was next to, a perfect demonstration of just how motionless and monotonous it was behind that glass.  
Even when the door clicked, he didn’t bother looking up, there were plenty of people missing, those with better things to do than actually turn up to classes; it was probably just another one of them who’d decided it was worth it to arrive. Well, probably not, after all, this particular class flung itself right over lunch, and to most students here such a thing as to attend would be unthinkable if it meant inconveniencing themselves.  
He only looked up when the person who’d arrived started to speak.  
“I’m so sorry to bother you, professor,” a smooth voice all but drawled across the room. Harry swallowed, it was Lestrange, and just behind him was Malfoy.  
“But could we,” he continued, “borrow Mr Potter?” he said as he leaned against the doorframe in a way that most people would label as provocative, though they wouldn’t quite know why. Maybe it was the press of his fingers into the frame just as Harry had done when watching things, he shouldn’t have seen. Or perhaps, it was simply how leaned right into the wood, pushing his hip against it.  
“Any particular reason, Aleister?”  
The informality almost caught Harry off guard, it was just so jarring to hear Lestrange’s name, the one Harry realised he hadn’t even known, be tossed around by someone twice his age. Someone who looked like he wouldn’t the slightest thing in common with a vibrant student with his best years still ahead of him.  
Lestrange only smiled again, tongue on the edge of his teeth, “you know,” he said casually, “we just really _need_ him right now.”  
The way he said it made Harry’s spine shiver, that sleek way his tongue ran over every word before spitting it out in front of him was just delectable. Enough that he started to get up without the professor even nodding his acquiesces. 

Lestrange dropped the niceties as soon as they were all through the door, and that usual streak of something that Harry would almost call cruelty was back running rivulets all over him, as though he was standing under the spray of a waterfall.  
“W-what did you want me for?” Harry asked once they’d taken ten paces and were decidedly heading towards the exit of the building, as opposed to its inner sanctums, those deep bowels of the university, invisible and untouchable to all but those who had learnt the way by heart.  
Lestrange just rolled his eyes.  
“So that we could have lunch before the next fucking century begins,” he said with an intonation of such casualness that anyone would mistake it for arrogance.  
“You pulled me out of a tutorial… to have lunch?”  
“Obviously,” said Malfoy coming to walk beside him on his left, trapping him between the two of them, “it’s not like you _needed_ to be there, and anyway, I made a reservation for one p.m., and I’m not going to miss it – ”  
“No, you didn’t,” cut in Lestrange, talking right over Harry’s head, “you _never_ make a fucking reservation _anywhere_.”  
The tone was definitely accusatory, but in a way that just about treading the right side of the wire in terms of friendliness. It was the sort of tone that he was allowed to use, but someone like Harry wasn’t.  
“Well, I nearly did,” replied Malfoy, the edge of a pout just starting to form itself on his mouth. Harry would have been lying if he said that it wasn’t a pretty expression, classy in a way that certainly wasn’t fair, and, from a certain angle, docile. Harry was certain he’d seen that expression painted on someone’s face before. The realisation jolted him hard as he understood where it was that he’d seen that look like a live spark pressed into the back of his neck. He remembered it stitched onto Malfoy’s mouth before, when he was down on his knees, looking up at Tom with the same sort of gaze, not entirely submissive, but rather, according to this exchange at least, more teasing.  
Neither of the other two noticed any change in Harry’s expression, if indeed it _did_ change at all, though Harry rather suspected it had.  
They just continued on with their conversation, that was now starting to border on a disagreement.  
“It’s a completely different sentence,” Lestrange was insisting.  
“They mean the same,” Malfoy was retorting just as childishly.  
“Which is why,” Lestrange said with a slight snipe between the constants, “you’ll always be a politician and never a lawyer, because you are useless at semantics.”  
“Oh, and you’re fantastic, are you?” came the decidedly sarcastic reply.  
Lestrange actually stopped walking, and just stood there in the middle of the corridor, waiting for Malfoy to stop as well. The few people that were milling around at the edges, hurriedly moved themselves along, like they knew something Harry didn’t.  
“You know I am,” said Lestrange, “but I’d be very willing to give you the tutorial I just gave some first years on the differences and uses for logical and lexical semantics, but I doubt you’d understand past the introductory sentence, so perhaps you just want to take my word as my word for once, alright?”  
Malfoy just sighed dramatically.  
“That doesn’t even make sense; your word as your word, what else would I take it as?”  
“Knowing you, you’d take it for anything you _fancied_.”  
There was a sourness to that, something that made Malfoy’s expression twist uncomfortably, but whatever exactly it was, Harry doubted he’d ever understand. It was just too a nuanced reference, an allusion to some private part of their lives that existed before he was around. There would be a lot of that; a lot of knowing that things had happened before he was with them, but, if Harry played his cards right, he might just make sure there wouldn’t be a time after him.

They were still debating, still, choice words being used, but Harry had missed a section, or maybe two or three.  
“…Oh, don’t hot-headed about it,” Malfoy was saying.  
“Well, don’t be so fucking cool-headed then,” Lestrange said back, but a smile had blossomed back on his face and there was a raise to his brow that suggested he was joking, at least a little.  
As they all walked together, Harry couldn’t help but notice how they seemed calmer than when he had last seen them, happier in a way, like a weight had been lifted from their shoulders. But the only difference that Harry could see between now and then was that Tom wasn’t here.  
That wasn’t to say the atmosphere was strained around Tom, merely that it was more… executive. Everyone knew the part they were supposed to play, and they played it to perfection. When Tom was around, they polished themselves, cleaned the crystal of their hearts until they were fully on display, their veneers as sharp and shiny as their wit.  
Now though, now, they were relaxed, not slackened with alcohol and music and the promise of highbrow conversations, but simply comfortable in themselves and their intrinsic value. For once, they didn’t feel the need to keep up a pretence and to be things that they were not.

The restaurant they took him to was large, and mostly full, though all Malfoy had to do was smile at the man at the door and he was led inside.  
High ceilings and roman style columns, which made Harry wonder whether they _only_ went to places with historical styled architecture; for as far as he could tell to be modern to them was to be outdated. But, fortunately, they all suited this old marvellous world that had passed on. Ground to dust beneath the feet of progress, the sort of thing kept alive only by fanatics and lost wanderers of time.  
Despite the grey outside, inside was lit with what had to be red in every shade available. It reflected off the walls and lit every surface on fire so that tablecloths that should have been white were dripping with pink that colour of candyfloss and everyone’s face was rubicund. Their clothes and their hands and their food all sitting somewhere between crimson and scarlet and burgundy. It was beautiful, in a bloodshot sort of way.  
As they walked between the redwood chairs and those candyfloss tables and the so many elegant pink-stained people, Harry watched as Malfoy smiled and preened, touching hands with them all; a shake for men and a kiss for women. This appeared to be his natural environment, a peacock wandering amongst ornamental flowers that all seemed to know him.  
Lestrange followed behind him, a little too close to Harry, in his opinion, and always watching him as a hawk might, as though he were about to bolt out the door, which was certainly a prospect he _had_ considered, and was still considering. He had a clear run; he could just avoid all the embarrassment that was certainly about to descend onto him like an avalanche down those French mountains his peers could afford to ski on, and just get away from it all; back to the contract tutorial, and the professor’s boring voice, and that little bluebird outside the window.  
Harry also got the curious feeling that people were watching him, that they were looking, and sizing him up for slaughter, and the more Malfoy looked back at him, the more people stared. Curious to see their new toy no doubt. For all he knew, they came here every week, always with a shiny, or, in his case, somewhat dim, thing that they sat with, and smiled at, and sacrificed for their own gain.  
And the more he thought about it, the more he tensed; his muscles turning to stone beneath his skin, and the more he tensed, the more he panicked, and the more he panicked, the less oxygen was available to fill up his lungs and the less oxygen there was the more he felt like a giant was rattling his brain all around his skull.  
Lestrange took a hold of his arm, gripping it tight; the texture of his gloves strange even through Harry’s jumper.  
“Breath, Potter; in and out and in and out, you got that?” he said, his hand still firm around him.  
Harry nodded, feeling the same way as when he had realised Tom’s fingers were stroking his back. That same protection and comfort, except, Lestrange wasn’t entirely equivalent. Behind Tom’s actions had been a sliver, however small, of warmth, and a frill or two of indulgence; with Lestrange, it held nothing more than pure practicality.  
“Now, you’re going to come with me, while we leave that peacock to finish preening, alright?” Lestrange said, already starting to push him towards a more secluded part of this restaurant. But before they could get that far, Malfoy had sidled up to Lestrange.  
“I heard that,” he said, digging his elbow, ever so casually, into Lestrange’s waist, whilst smiling like they were the best of friends.  
“Yeah, you were fucking supposed to.”

The booth Lestrange showed him to was nice, private, but not shoved into the back of beyond. Rather, just enough away from everyone else to make it feel as though they were alone, especially as Harry was facing away from the crowds. Not to mention, there was something awfully sophisticated about sitting on red leather chairs. The sound they made when he shifted and their coolness to the touch, that smooth sleekness that shouldn’t remind him of Tom’s smile, but somehow did anyway.  
Lestrange sat across from him, his hands smoothing across the tablecloth, speckled with the cerise that ran off the lights. Malfoy slid in beside him, which probably made the whole scenario more intimidating than it was supposed to be, but then again, it was probably better than they couldn’t see him wracking his hands and cracking his knuckles under the table like that would somehow make him more comfortable.  
“So… umm… w-why are we here?” said Harry quietly, unable to shake the far-fetched fantasy that he was about to be disposed of, dumped as a friend in the middle of a restaurant because he saw something he shouldn’t have.  
“Because it’s what friends do; they go out to lunch,” said Malfoy, already opening the menu, but looking distinctly _over_ it, at what Harry thought might be a someone across the room. Probably another great _someone_ he knew.  
“But – ” he started.  
Lestrange interrupted.  
“We want to get to know you, Potter, properly, you didn’t say much when we _all_ got together, so we thought you might be a little more talkative if it was just us?”  
Harry swallowed. It was certainly less intimidating with only four pairs of eyes on him, especially when Tom’s counted as an infinite number of burning irises all of which seemed to see right down into the deepest, darkest depths of his soul. Compared to that, Malfoy and Lestrange scarcely scratched the surface.  
But still the thought of ‘getting to know them’ was nauseating, a black sludge of apprehension began to slide its way through his blood, cooling him from the inside out until every part of him felt clammy and deeply uncomfortable, though he couldn’t exactly why.  
Maybe, it was because if they got to know him, they’d understand he wasn’t as interesting as they thought he was; they’d discover that he was ordinary and boring and not all clever and sophisticated, and then they’d just throw him away and he’d be left knowing what he _could_ have had if he was that much more remarkable.  
“After all,” said Lestrange when no one had taken the initiative to interrupt him, “Riddle says you can argue for the high heavens if you fucking want, but _I’ve_ never heard you, and if I don’t hear you soon, I’m going to start thinking you’re playing favourites.”  
Harry _might_ have said something, explained the situation as best he could. Make him understand that he wasn’t playing favourites, it was merely that Tom did things to him he couldn’t explain. He _made_ him want to argue and debate and drag himself out of that protective shell. But he didn’t say any of that because Malfoy was already speaking by the time his brain had even processed what Lestrange had said.  
“Can’t you watch your language? We’re not in one of your backend pubs,” Malfoy said, pulling a face.  
“It’s a private club, and you _fucking_ know it,” said Lestrange back, the slightest of sneers affecting his tone. “You’re just salty because you’re not invited.”  
“I don’t want to be invited down some back-alley, where my chances of being murdered increase exponentially, thanks,” Malfoy retorted, the flick of his hair, just a touch too practised to be a merely casual gesture. Harry could picture Malfoy, flicking his hair in Tom’s direction every time he said something, he didn’t like.  
“That’s got nothing to do with the location and _everything_ to do with the fact you’re a prat.”  
Malfoy shoved him against the high back of the chair, with just enough force right on Lestrange’s collarbone that Harry couldn’t help but see a maliciousness in the action. An unnecessary viciousness that had Harry swallowing and almost subconsciously reaching up to touch at his own collarbones through his shirt and wandering what it felt like to have a fist against them.  
But, however gratuitously violent Malfoy’s actions were, they didn’t get a reaction. Lestrange just continued to smile, the tip of his tongue visible again between his teeth.

Far too slowly Malfoy retracted his hand rather like a dog might give up ownership of a bone if pressed by its owner.  
“But first,” he said, clearly trying to brighten his mood from the inside out, “lunch. What would you like, Potter? We’re paying.”  
Harry picked up a menu made of the same red leather that had his fingers itching; he didn’t remember receiving it, but it didn’t matter, it was in his hands now.  
He started to scan through the options. There were a lot. Organised, apparently, in no particular way, with no particular aim in mind other than to list. To make matters worse, the handwriting was looped and twirled in a way that was almost impossible to read, and certainly impossible if you had no idea what half the listings were actually supposed to be.  
“Umm…,” Harry said, still scanning, always glossing straight over anything that seemed unreasonably priced, which was pretty much everything on the menu; “I’ll just have the sandwich.”  
The silence that followed made him swallow, and look up very slowly from his little leather prison, Malfoy was staring at him with an expression that could only be described as disdainful.  
“You will _not_ be ordering a sandwich,” he said.  
“I thought…”  
“When I said, order anything you like, I meant something worth eating,” Malfoy continued, the expression still not leaving. From an objective point of view, Harry would have said Malfoy had never eaten a sandwich. Perhaps if he did, then he’d learn to appreciate the art form of poverty.  
“What’s wrong with a sandwich?” Harry said, a little defensively, after all, the humble sandwich was very much a staple of his current diet. Most meals, he’d found, could quite easily be replaced with sandwiches in one form or another, usually with some cheap spread like honey or low-quality jam.  
“The problem,” Malfoy said, speaking as though Harry’s diet had _personally_ offended him, “is sandwiches are so… dull, and _anyway_ , if we’d wanted to take you out for just a sandwich, we could have stayed at the university, with their rather… unique approach to food. But _we_ made the effort to take you out.”  
“Sorry– ” Harry started, thinking he should just go now and save them any further embarrassment.  
“You don’t have to apologis– ”  
“Correction,” interrupted Lestrange, his fingers snapping right in front of Malfoy’s face, “never apologise.”  
Malfoy glared at him and mouthed something that Harry didn’t catch. Though, by the way Lestrange raised an eyebrow, it didn’t appear to have been appreciated.  
Just by being around them for a few minutes, Harry got the distinct feeling that a discussion with Lestrange was somewhat similar to being pelted with stones, just one thing after another until Harry could virtually feel the bruises starting to form on his tongue. With Malfoy, it was different, it was still being buried, but this time, it was far more similar to drowning. To have more and more water poured onto of him, so that it was smooth on the skin, but no less suffocating.  
“What I’m saying,” Malfoy said carefully, considering each word before he released it from his mouth, “is that you can have a sandwich anywhere; but we’d love you to try something with a little more…”  
“…Class,” finished Lestrange.  
For once Malfoy didn’t glare, he just continued to smile, his pink stained hands, looking almost bloody, as they rest on the table.  
“So, at least _look_ at everything else.”

Speaking of looking, Malfoy was looking around a lot, but always at the same thing. Always subtle enough that if Harry hadn’t been watching him so carefully, he might not have seen how he looked over his menu and smiled.  
In the guise of just looking around, Harry turned for a brief second to skim his eyes across the rest of the restaurant. But even a short glance was long enough to see what had caught Malfoy’s eye. A waitress balancing several wine glasses on a glass tray.  
She saw them watching and smiled, before putting down the tray and its contents, and started to approach, though not before she had surreptitiously smoothed down her dress and given her hair a quick pat-down.  
It wasn’t necessary, she was a pretty girl. Not in the same way as Druella, or that red-haired girl Harry liked to look at, but still nice. Her hair was either cut short or done up in a way that eluded Harry, he’d never understood how girls managed to do their makeup and hair so well every day. It was just another one of those grand secrets that all women had but would never share.  
When she arrived by the table, she smiled again all big and bright, and tucked her hair behind her ear, even though it wasn’t in her eyes. She fitted in here, with her dark hair glazed with the red light, and lipstick in almost a matching shade that made her smile so much whiter.  
She swallowed before she spoke, her hands fumbling a little as she tried to get her notebook out of her pocket.  
“Good afternoon; what I can I get you gentlemen for – for,” she lost her train of thought quite suddenly when both Lestrange and Malfoy turned to look at her at once. “I’m sorry – err – what can I get you to drink or – err – to eat?”  
She swallowed again like there was a rock with jagged edges in her throat. Harry knew what that was like; he knew how hot her palms must feel, and how cold that string down her spine must be.  
Though he still watched with curiosity as her eyes lingered first on Lestrange, he did not return the gaze. Or he did, but it wasn’t the sort of gaze anyone wanted on them. Too ragged at the edges, prickly like the blackberry brambles that used to grow where Harry used to live. And though, they, much like Lestrange, were striking, they always pricked his fingers and made him bleed. The blood mixing with their juices until his hands were just steeped in this sticky red sweetness.  
Harry swallowed and shook himself, suddenly aware he had been staring at his hands, flexing his fingers, trying to see every part that was inside him and imagining them coated, once again, with that sheen that was the same colour as the wine Tom liked to drink.  
Malfoy hadn’t noticed him, but Lestrange had, and his eyes were dark and interested, as though just by looking he could see the stains on Harry’s fingers.  
Harry turned away to watch the waitress’ own fingers as she fiddled with her notepad. Just smoothing over the coil binding at the top before running the tip of her nail down the edge. If the bubbling of conversation had been quieter, Harry would have been able to hear the scraping of her nail on the paper. She didn’t notice him watching, she didn’t really notice anything other than the way Malfoy was looking at her; like she really meant _something_.  
It wasn’t the same gaze as he had afforded to Tom, rather the complete opposite. With Tom, Malfoy had been demure, reserved, always waiting to see how much he could have before taking it, but now, Malfoy was looking at her with a confidence that must have flowed like a river from a self-assurance that he was indeed desirable, which he was.  
He returned her gazes with the gift of a smile. A slight, lazy, smile that spread from the corner of his mouth. It was the sort of gaze, Harry wished he could master; attractive, and provocative, and all just on the right side of tasteful.  
“Err – so, do you gentlemen know what you want, or err – should I give you a little more time?"  
“I, for one, know what I want,” Malfoy said slowly, his eyes dipping down to take in the full length of her body. She blushed and smiled, the fingers on her right hand twirling the hair around her ears. She continued to smile even when Lestrange interrupted the moment, cutting brutally between them so that he could order.

Without the slightest bit of shame for interrupting, Lestrange ordered a salad in a manner that just about passed as polite enough for polite society. Or, what Harry had thought was polite society, but now, he was having seconds thoughts. Perhaps, polite society did exist, but they weren’t part of it; they were something much more magnificent: high society, in all its glittering gory glory.  
Malfoy continued to smile at the woman like she was the prettiest thing in the world, before Lestrange kicked him under the table, hard enough that Harry felt it as well. At which point, his smile turned to a glare and he deigned to order the unpronounceable, in Harry’s opinion, vermicelli soufflé.  
Then it was Harry’s turn. The waitress continued to politely smile, even as Lestrange and Malfoy talked, coerced or perhaps even threatened, Harry wasn’t entirely sure anymore, him into having what was apparently just pasta with some sort of tomatoes.  
If he hated it, it would be entirely his own fault for not wanting to probe too far, and so he was just sort of hoping they were right that it was actually nice, or, tolerably edible.  
It was entirely strange to have suggestions given to him, having _choice_ itself was a novelty, and one Harry was learning he didn’t really want. It would be so much easier for someone to just do it all for him, to introduce him to these things one by one; someone like Tom. Which was weird because the role that he assigned to Tom was no different to the one Lestrange and Malfoy were currently fulfilling. But something made him trust Tom’s opinion in a way that he didn’t for either Lestrange or Malfoy, no matter how much they smiled and said that it would all be fine.  
All it was, was a nervous nagging at the base of his stomach, but it was enough to further put him on edge, enough that he was subconsciously gripping at the tablecloth and twisting it between his fingers. In the deepest, darkest part of his mind, the one that he wasn’t entirely willing to truly acknowledge, Harry wanted Tom to be there. To sit beside him and order for him, because Tom… would know what he wanted, even if he didn’t know himself.  
Both Lestrange and Malfoy also ordered wine, with “it’s never too early to drink rosé,” as the excuse, but that didn’t stop the creeping feeling down Harry’s back that it was indeed too early to be drinking anything that wasn’t tea or water; he was having the latter.  
The waitress smiled at their order, or more specifically, she smiled at Malfoy, and then just nodded to both him and Lestrange. She thanked them and turned away, and Malfoy continued to watch completely shamelessly; his eyes sweeping over every line like he was an artist painting her figure with his eyes.  
As soon as she had turned her back, and was a suitable distance away, Lestrange hit Malfoy with his gloves.  
“Didn’t anyone ever tell you it’s rude to stare?”  
Malfoy didn’t even turn to look at him.  
“Didn’t anyone ever tell you it’s rude to resort to violence?” he said, still watching the last flays of her skirt before she disappeared around a corner and into the main section of the restaurant. 

Over the next few minutes, more than a few looks were exchanged between her and Malfoy. Harry would catch him, in between the heaves and swells of the faint and, very polite, conversation, just drifting off slightly, his mind leaving behind the mundane suggestions of the weather and university life, and begin to meander, as a river does, to more… _personal_ concerns. She was looking back as well, even when Malfoy was actually engaging in the conversation, Harry could see her; her neck craned, looking back at the table, far more than necessary.  
He might have said that it was similar to the way Tom and Malfoy had been looking back and forth, but it wasn’t. Sitting here, watching the two of them smile back and forth at each other, the hints of what they wanted, and it was _obvious_ what they wanted, weaving between the people and chatter; it was clear, this wasn’t the same.  
This was soft, sweet, a fleeting moment caught before his eyes, just a tenderness. The same sort of things as Harry had accidentally witnessed the wide, open, studios of the art department when he had stumbled in there after dark. He hadn’t meant to be there, he probably wasn’t even allowed, but he had been, and he’d seen the way that girl with the pale hair had smiled at the girl with the freckles that dabbled across her skin like ivy across tree bark. He’d seen how they’d touched their hands, and he might have seen more if he hadn’t scarpered.  
But that sort of look didn’t exist between Malfoy and Tom, or maybe it did, but it was so coated in this darkness, glazed over with sort rawness that cut straight to his bones. Watching them had been what Harry imagined it was like to drown in oil, feeling the sticky sludge slide through his lungs, scorching and melting as it went. Harry doubted he’d ever see that sort of look outside Tom’s company, and he certainly didn’t see it here.  
Though, every time Malfoy _did_ look over, he was treated to a look from Lestrange. A knowing, unimpressed sort of look; both a warning and an expression of disapproval before he’d even done anything. To give him credit, Malfoy didn’t take any notice. Or, maybe he did, but firmly compartmentalised any disapproval, and filed it under things he didn’t particularly care about. 

By the time she brought their drinks, more than a dozen of these poison-laced glances had passed between them, and they were really starting to interrupt the flow of conversation. Not that Harry minded; just watching was something he was far better at then talking about things he neither understood, nor cared about.  
She didn’t appear to notice as she placed the glasses down; Lestrange’s first, then Harry’s, and then Malfoy’s, where her hand lingered for a few seconds more than was professional.  
She still had nice hands; all soft and smooth. The nails short but kept nice, unlike Harry’s own, he caught them too much, on any surface available and they always broke low enough that they scraggly and unkempt.  
In Harry’s honest opinion, that moment, with the two of them staring at each other, seemed to last forever, and it must have done for Lestrange as well because he coughed obnoxiously and rolled his eyes several times, each one more dramatic than the last. At the same time, his fingers began tapping on the gloves that he’d left prominently on the table, probably as a reminder that, as Harry was learning, he wasn’t particularly patient. 

When she managed to eventually separate herself from Malfoy long enough to actually bring over their food, Harry couldn’t help but have apprehensions. He’d never been a fussy eater per se, but he’d also never eaten food, he couldn’t really pronounce, and as much as that tiny voice in the back of his head tried to convince him otherwise, he simply didn’t feel good enough for this food.  
Though, his doubts were somewhat quelled when she placed it down in front of him. As far as he could see from a first glance, it looked entirely ordinary. Not the sort of thing he’d be able to cook himself, but the sort of thing he could _imagine_ cooking; if he had the means, and the basic skills, and the effort; but he _could_ if he really tried.  
To put what this dish was simply, was to say it was pasta in a shape Harry didn’t even know you could buy, littered with ingredients of all colours he assumed must be edible. A dash of green and smidge of orange and all of it, glazed in that same sticky pink glow that everything here was. Such a pervasive glow that infused everything, from the forks to Harry’s water, almost making it the same colour as their wine. But despite this prettiness, Harry continued to eye the entire meal with suspicion, even if it did look _so_ much better than what his usual lunches looked like, he didn’t entirely trust it, though he couldn’t say why.  
“Is there anything else I can do for you?” she said, her voice taking on soft lilt that it had not had before, and her eyes once again _only_ fixing on Malfoy.  
In different circumstances, Harry might have felt offended, but, right now, he’d rather stay anonymous. He’d only just decided that, maybe, he did actually like humans as a species, as long as they fitted into a very specific mould, and there was no way he wanted to do anything else to do with anyone right now, except maybe if that person was Tom.  
But Malfoy interrupted his carefully construed thoughts by speaking.  
“Yes, actually, I think there is,” he said looking at her intently enough that Harry couldn’t help but feel he was interrupting something. It was as though they had known each other for years and then somehow separated, and now they were reunited for a moment. But Harry also knew he over-romanticised something that was not romantic. Now, what was between Tom and Malfoy, _that_ was romantic, at least on one side of the equator, but this, well it wasn’t, was it? This was just a search for meaning when the world was devoid of it. The pursuit of satisfaction, even in the most inappropriate of times. 

“Could you show me the cloakroom?” Malfoy was saying, still silky and as smooth as his wine.  
“Oh, of course…” she said, the disappointment obvious in her tone, “it’s just over there,” she said her hand, waving vaguely to a doorway a few feet behind them. Somehow, everything about her closed up in that moment, as a tulip does at night, she furled herself up, and Harry recognised well the slight embarrassment that came with overestimating your worth.  
But Malfoy merely smiled.  
“I’m sorry, I think you misunderstand,” he said, standing up, a little too close to her. If the restaurant had been empty, it would have been noticeable, but everyone here was too busy paying attention to themselves to notice a waitress.  
“I want you to _show_ me the cloakroom.”  
She blushed again and giggled at her own mistake.  
“ _Oh_ – yes, yes, of – of course,” she repeated unnecessarily and turned to start walking.  
Malfoy was about to follow when Lestrange slapped his hand flat down against his, trapping it, though only superficially, on the tabletop.  
“Must you do this _everywhere_ we go?” he hissed.  
Malfoy leaned down, “I rather think it makes or breaks an establishment,” he said with a smile bright enough to burn, “how accommodating the staff are, is _always_ a good indicator of quality, wouldn’t you say?”  
“No, I wouldn’t,” Lestrange said, as he pressed his palm harder into Malfoy’s knuckles, enough pressure that he winced, and his smile turned to a glare.  
“All that I _would_ say is Druella would hate you, and I hardly think Riddle would sing your praises either.”  
“Nor would you, apparently; pray tell, does it offend your fragile sense of morality?” he said all as sleek and slippery as Tom might have said, but with a nuance of warmth and joviality that distinguished it. If Tom had delivered the line it would have been murderous, but with Malfoy, it was quite the opposite, harmless, as though this was a mere inconvenience to his day as opposed to the weighty moral dilemma that Lestrange seemed intent on turning it into.  
“Don’t talk to me about fucking morals, Malfoy,” he snapped.  
“Then don’t lecture me. I’m not your wife, nor are you my Reverend, so I don’t have to listen to _anything_ you say. I can do whatever I want, and right now, I want to _enjoy_ myself whilst I still can.”  
“You’ll enjoy yourself even when you fucking can’t,” Lestrange spat back. The bitterness as obvious as a flower in bloom; at that precise moment, Lestrange didn’t sound like he _liked_ Malfoy or the things he did.  
Harry himself wasn’t so sure what to think. It certainly sounded wrong, looked wrong, and felt wrong. Commodification was the first word that came to mind, quickly followed by exploitation, neither of which were particularly positive interpretations. But, at the same time, it sounded exciting, the sort of dangerous, deviant, thing that Harry would never do, however much he was starting to want to.  
They stayed watching each other for a second like they were having a silent debate about this behind their eyes before Lestrange lifted his hand and released Malfoy from the somewhat pathetic grip he had been in.  
“Fine,” Lestrange said, “do whatever you want, but if you’re more than twenty-five minutes, then I’m ordering everything on the menu, including that very rare bottle of Madeira Pather, and leaving _you_ with the cheque.”  
Malfoy rolled his eyes, “fine by me,” he said, snatching his hand back up and following the pretty waitress towards the cloakroom. 

With Malfoy gone, there was a large, empty, space beside Lestrange, and its presence, or rather lack thereof, made conversation falter. Apparently, Lestrange was a touch too prickly to bother with small talk. So, the space swelled, and the silence spilled out between them until it was utterly palpable in the air; a dark, wet thing that seeped through Harry’s skin and made him damp and awkward.  
Whether deliberate or not, it was all made worse by Lestrange, even though he wasn’t doing anything. He was just sitting there, his right hand casually splayed on the table and his left hidden underneath.  
What should have been a simple and even pleasant silence to gather his thoughts, was interrupted by a buzzing inside his head. A single thought rebounding off the walls of his skull until he couldn’t ignore it any longer. _“I am not your wife”_. It could, quite easily, have been non-literal, but just the tang of the edge of Malfoy’s tongue has suggested it wasn’t.  
Harry knew he, probably, shouldn’t be so interested in their private lives, but he couldn’t help it when they were dangled so tantalisingly before his eyes. Suddenly he wanted nothing more than to see if it was true, confirm the thing that Malfoy had alluded to confirming. For that was the one truly convenient thing about marriage was the evidence it left behind. Some were private signs: marriage certificates and photographs and outfits and memories, but others, they were public declarations. All he needed was to observe Lestrange’s fingers, just to see if he had a ring.  
But, almost like Lestrange knew that was Harry wanted, he kept his left hand firmly _under_ the table, and instead just leaned back on the seat and sighed, cutting through that silence like one might break an egg into a bowl. One harsh crack and all the solemnity dissolved.  
With an unnatural grace, Lestrange inclined his head towards Harry but began to spread the rest of himself out, oozing into Malfoy’s seat, now that Malfoy was not there to share it.  
“You know, he thinks that this is a victimless crime,” Lestrange said, casually picking up what might have been a walnut from his salad and tossing it into his mouth, “all because he _thinks_ it doesn’t impact anyone apart from him and her, but in actual fact, it has far-reaching consequences for you and I as well.”  
The way in which his tongue glided around the words was truly _uncomfortable_ ; they were touch to familiar in his mouth, and Harry got the distinct feeling this wasn’t the first time Lestrange had made this sort of complaint to trapped witness.  
“For one, it’s fucking impolite,” he said, “and two, now we’re not going to get service because he insisted on fucking our waitress.”  
Lestrange rolled his neck back, stretching himself out a little more and taking another walnut, “I mean, he could of, at least, had the decency to use the one over from us, wouldn’t you say?”  
Harry wasn’t sure what he was supposed to say at all, so he said nothing. Instead, focussing his energy into pushing the pasta around with his fork and hoping that Lestrange would take his silence for agreement. After all, what was he supposed to say? That Malfoy was immoral? That he condemned his actions? How could he? When said actions looked so fun. The sort of on-the-edge life Harry almost wished he was brave enough to live. The sort where he didn’t have inhibitions and he just went with the world, let every experience flow through him like water, but he wasn’t like that. He had reservations. Multiple reservations. 

They sat in silence for another minute, Harry pushing the food around his plate, and occasionally eating a bite. It was _genuinely_ good, but it still felt wrong to be eating when Malfoy wasn’t with them. A violation of some practice he couldn’t quite remember learning but was now so embedded into his psyche that he was never going to be released from it.  
Lestrange must have picked up on it because he was looking at him with an eyebrow raised.  
“If you’re hungry, eat; don’t bother waiting for _him_ to get back.”  
Harry smiled meekly and continued to push the food around. He didn’t why he was being so awkward, he just was. This was all so new and exhausting, and as nice as it was to eat real food, the emotional cost of it currently felt unnervingly high.  
There was no denying that when Harry still didn’t eat, Lestrange’s fingers started to tap as a direct response. And after a few minutes of irritated silence, he snapped and looked behind him in the direction of the cloakroom. No one was there.  
So, he leaned over, though he didn’t exactly have far to go, and took a forkful of Malfoy’s food.  
“There’s no need to stand on ceremony now,” he said, immediately eating it as if it were his own.  
“You want any?” he asked looking up, “I mean, it’s good and he fucking deserves it for leaving it unattended.”  
“Umm – sure,” Harry said, he didn’t know why, but this might be his only opportunity to try all this stuff, so he might as well make it count.  
“Take it straight from the bowl then, that way, if he does even notice then it’s all my fault and not yours,” he said with a smile that made Harry feel warm, not in the same way as he did when Tom smiled at him, but similar. This was much more friendly, innocent, and for the first time, truly, in his life, Harry felt included in something. Even if that something was a direct robbery of someone’s food. 

About a quarter of Malfoy’s food later, Lestrange went back to his salad. Though not before he leaned closer; his elbow pressed into the table and his head resting on his right hand as if they weren’t in a restaurant at all.  
“I’ll say this now, Potter,” he said, lifting his head just to gather a forkful of his own lunch to eat, “if you’re going to idolise; don’t idolise Malfoy, he’s not a good influence.”  
Harry swallowed.  
“Who is then?” he said quietly, curious whether Lestrange would bring Tom into all this, or whether he would continue to leave him as the unspoken extra guest at the table, somehow present because of the sheer fact he wasn’t.  
Lestrange paused. For far too long really. Enough that Harry ate smaller bites of food, just so there would be enough to last this entire conversation. As he did so, he half-watched how the light dappled around Lestrange, making it look like speckles of blood were dusted across his face. Harry wasn’t sure why his immediate had been blood, but the thought of fruits or paint just didn’t do the colour justice. And something about blood and Lestrange went together like an artist and blue paint; not entirely necessary for each other, but significantly limited without. It might have been the savagery in his smile or the red glitter behind his eyes, but either way, there was something that suggested blood and Lestrange were meant to go together.  
Lestrange himself did not appear to notice Harry’s considerations; he was too busy thinking whilst staring at the light as a moth would.  
“Rosier,” he said eventually, cutting into the pleasant silence that had formed.  
“Not…?”  
He didn’t even need to finish before Lestrange was laughing.  
“Riddle? Fuck no.”  
Only the second after he said it though, he seemed to realise the finality of the statement was inappropriate. That it contravened an unspoken rule known only to a select few but sensed by everyone. Lestrange tried to smile naturally, to settle all his features back into something neutral, so as to take away from what he had just said and pretend that it wasn’t something unsayable.  
“I mean, of course, he’s an influence, but Riddle has…” he paused, the _right_ word clearly eluding him for a while; hiding in the corners of his mouth where his tongue did not probe.  
“… _sharp_ edges, if you know what I mean; when Rosier, he’s as soft as a marshmallow. You ever had a marshmallow? They’re lovely little things”  
The shock of the change, from heavy to light in the blink of an eye was jarring, but Harry still shook his head, after all, it was far easier than speaking. Though, the uneasiness remained, in the back of his skull, like a veil behind which was a monster and not a bride.  
From the short meetings Harry had had with Rosier, he would not have described him in terms of marshmallows, but maybe he was wrong. Not that it mattered, how they’d got to this topic was forgotten to Lestrange, now that the topic of confectionary had been brought up.  
Of course, he knew what marshmallows were, he’d seen them in the shop windows and smelled them on street corners, but he’d never tasted one. His excuse was that they were often expensive, and even if they weren’t, it somehow seemed like a luxury he shouldn’t allow himself.  
“Well, as soon as we get our waitress back, I’ll buy you some,” Lestrange said with a satisfied smile.  
“Umm…Thanks.”  
“You don’t need to thank me, we’re friends.”

Harry smiled; he could feel the heat on his face; that slight blush that always appeared at the worst possible times. At least, here he might be spared the worst of the colour visibly spilling down his neck. Lestrange smiled too, and with an action that was excessively deliberate, he lifted his left hand to raise his glass to him mouth. He sipped his wine slowly, the contraction of his throat oddly hypnotic, before placing the glass down again.  
Though his right hand immediately picked up his fork again and began to stab at a leaf of his salad, his left stayed stroking around the base of the glass, his thumb sliding up and up the stem, over and over the curve.  
Harry could see it now. That little bit of gold he had been searching for. The strangely delicate ring on his ring finger was so _obvious_. Harry couldn’t stop watching it. Staring and staring at the way the light reflected on it, casting a gold sparkle onto the background of pink like the milky way had been inverted before his eyes.  
“I didn’t know you were married,” Harry said quietly, for want of anything better to say, and, anyway, it was now like the elephant in the room. That large thing that was hanging over both of them, just waiting to be said, so he might as well go and say it.  
He didn’t mind whether Lestrange was or not. Rather, the thing pressing so acutely into the back of his head was that marriage was just such a _big_ thing; it held so many connotations, and responsibilities and obligations, and suddenly Lestrange didn’t look old enough for any of them.  
“Well, I am,” said Lestrange nonchalantly as he played with his salad like they were simply discussing the weather, and not how he was spending the rest of his life with the same girl. The same girl, that he had happened never to have mentioned before.  
“How long?”  
“Well…” he paused, his tongue searching for a date, “…we had our two-year anniversary in August, and now it’s November; you do the maths.”  
Two years, three months and however many days. It sounded like such a long time, even if it wasn’t really. Suddenly, Harry felt quite young, _very_ young; he was only eighteen now, so when Lestrange had got married he’d only just turned sixteen, not that that mattered; but Lestrange couldn’t have been _that_ old either, the maximum he could have been must have –  
“Before you ask, I was nineteen, we both were,” he said slowly, before adding, “it’s not _that_ young.”  
Harry opened his mouth to say… to say… something, but there was really nothing to say, nothing that he _could_ say, and so he closed it again. Lestrange could say whatever he liked, but nineteen was young. And yes, maybe Harry didn’t know what it was like to pledge the rest of his life to someone else; before a few days ago, he’d never even thought about it, but still, the prospect of marriage was horrifying.  
Until Harry had met Tom, there had been no one he’d even fathomed wanting to spend more than a few hours with, and yet, here was Lestrange having given away his entire life to someone else.  
He took another forkful of pasta, silently cursing them for choosing a seat with no window to stare casually out of. The only things that he could stare at without being surreptitious were Lestrange and the cloakroom, neither of which he particularly wanted to look at right now.

“You know, you _can_ ask questions if you fucking have them,” Lestrange said between mouthfuls of his and Malfoy’s food.  
Harry swallowed, his throat felt dry and itchy, and this whole conversation had made his stomach turn, and not in a good way.  
“It’s… you know… such a… such a… I don’t know.”  
Lestrange smiled, his eyes settling on the rim of his glass.  
“It’s fine, you should have seen Avery’s face when he found out; compared to him, you’re doing pretty well.”  
That was mildly reassuring. Though Harry could practically see Avery’s stumbling and fumbling, his tongue somehow tripping over every word, he didn’t look like he took surprises particularly well, even less, the ones to do with interpersonal relationships.  
“What about the others?” Harry asked, for, whilst he could imagine Avery’s awkward blustering, he couldn’t quite imagine what their reactions would be. They all seemed too distant, too disconnected from the real world to let this sort of thing touch them. Really, they all appeared too ephemeral, too transient, just passing through this world on their way to enlightenment to actually have to deal with human connections.  
“What about them?” Lestrange replied with that same detachment which was as irritating as it was enviable.  
“How did they… take it?”  
“Oh,” he said, apparently caught off guard, “they were at my wedding. Druella was one of my wife’s bridesmaids, Riddle was my best man, and Rosier and Mulc– Malfoy managed to turn up. I can’t honestly say if they were fucking sober but,” he smiled, “they were all there.”  
“Oh.”  
It was Harry’s turn to sit slightly gormlessly, his mouth still open. But he could see it now, that understanding, that camaraderie of the five of them, six he supposed if they included Lestrange’s bride; just the six of them laughing by the flowers and dancing on the lawns and being complete disinterested in everyone else because they were in their own little cosmos, where nothing but themselves really mattered. 

Lestrange interrupted his little daydream.  
“What about you? There anyone in your life?”  
“No,” he paused, now that he thought about it, the response had been too strong, too forceful, and apparently Lestrange thought the same because now he was leaning in closer, that vicious smile replacing the more gentile one.  
“No one?” he said, eyebrow raised, “how about I rephrase the question: is there anyone you’d _like_ in your life?”  
Harry swallowed, if the flush from earlier had died down, it now rose again like a phoenix from the flames. There was no way on heaven or earth that he was going to outright admit to Lestrange that the one person crushing in on his mind like Typhon waves on rocks, was his friend, even less could he tell _Malfoy_ that. And supposing he _did_ tell them, well, it wouldn’t stay a secret; they’d almost certainly tell all the others, including Tom, and then Harry wouldn’t have any choice but to hide in his room and never come out again. For it was one thing to have a private little infatuation, it was quite another to have the unattainable man of his darkest dreams _know_ about it.  
So, he just squirmed in his chair, half wishing the floor could just swallow him up, and absolutely avoiding all eye contact with Lestrange. After all, if he looked at the table long enough, it did become interesting; how the tablecloth was crinkled in some places and not others, how it scrunched up around the drinks but not around the plates, how Lestrange’s elbows resting heavily on the edge was messing the entire arrangement. 

“There is _someone_ , isn’t there?” Lestrange said, the words weaving out from between his teeth and his chin resting on his hands and that infuriating smile embroidered into his mouth.  
Harry shrugged as casually as he could, hoping that it neither confirmed nor denied exactly what he was thinking and that maybe, just hopefully, Lestrange could drag his own conclusion from the slurry without pressing him further.  
“Oh, Potter, you can do better than that.”  
He swallowed, excuses spinning around his head like a hurricane.  
“They don’t like me… back, so, it doesn’t – really – matter,” he said, honestly, though he had quickly decided he was perfectly willing to be dishonest if it got Lestrange away from smiling like he knew every secret that had ever passed through Harry’s head.  
But Lestrange just leaned closer, until it looked like a truly _confidential_ conversation, the sort of thing rich men had in restaurants like this, backstreet deals and shady transactions all veiled in the privacy of gentlemen at dinner.  
“You know, there are always ways of _making_ people like you, Potter; we’d be very happy to start acquainting you with them…”  
Harry leant back into his chair, his hand flat on the tablecloth just to stop it shaking and drawing unwanted attention. It wasn’t an indecent proposal, and perhaps if the object of his newfound affections wasn’t quite so cosmic, Harry might have accepted, but still, there was a wave of indecency that hung around the proposition like fog in the morning. A deeply, _disturbing_ feeling snaking between the wires in his stomach.  
He must have shown the apprehension on his face because Lestrange retracted, just enough, and not in any way that suggested he was offended.  
“…if that’s something you want, of course,” he clarified, though this time there was definitely the hint of something sinister behind his tone, like a pinch of some unknown spice that permeated all the way through a dish, making it taste good but… different, a little ominous in ways Harry couldn’t quite explain, but _felt_ right in the very nadirs of his stomach.  
“But still, they must have been _charming_ to catch your eye,” Lestrange continued with that same deliberate tone, as though he already knew _exactly_ who it was that Harry had been watching, and now he was merely trying to get Harry to say it out loud. To admit, just how much he wanted Tom to notice him, _just him_. How much he wanted things he couldn’t even articulate but all involved Tom’s tongue curling around words like they were candy canes.  
“Someone, _intelligent_. Someone, _argumentative_. Just someone who offers a bit of _excitement_ , right?”  
Harry shrugged and pushed the last pieces of his pasta around the plate, avoiding Lestrange’s bright eyes that were starting to sting at his forehead, and, instead, wondering if they’d charge them extra for the tomato stain on the tablecloth.  
“Come on, Potter, I’m trying to get to fucking know you, and you’re sitting there as tight-lipped as a doxy in the confession box.”

Harry still didn’t reply. If Lestrange didn’t like it, then he could just report back to all the others not to bother because he wasn’t as interesting as they’d all mistakenly believed him to be.  
“Silence possesses few benefits, Potter, other than trying my patience, and whilst Riddle claimed not to bite, I make no such guarantees.”  
The tone was unsympathetic. A sly thing that Harry could practically feel gripping his wrists and telling him to talk as though this were a police investigation.  
When Harry still didn’t say anything, Lestrange sat back and put down his fork. Instead, he crossed his arms, mirroring Harry’s own movements, except with more assurance that he was right.  
“Would you rather do casual conversation? Because I’m not one for that, so if you’d prefer to do small talk about the fucking weather, tell me now, so I don’t have to waste my fucking time and we can just wait for Malfoy to get back, alright?”  
It was a cold statement, laced with a disappointment that Tom would probably have put slightly more tactfully. Harry couldn’t even remember when he’d started comparing everything to Tom; when he’d become the benchmark for all appropriate responses, he just had. But Tom couldn’t help him now because, now, if he were Tom, he’d smile, and make some sort of clever quip that put Lestrange right back in his place; and _he_ couldn’t do that. Well, he could, but Lestrange would probably eat him alive.  
“I just – ” Harry swallowed, “I just don’t know what I’m supposed to say, alright,” he said quickly, the words all running out like a stain on a white shirt, unable to avoid how his voice cracked in the worst possible way.  
Lestrange didn’t move; in fact, the only motion at all from him, came from his fingers as he used them to hold his fork as he stirred the remaining leaves of his salad. Like that, he was absent, considering all the options meticulously. Intently enough that Harry tensed when Lestrange looked up at him, his eyes wandering all over his face.  
“To be quite honest, I don’t fucking care what you say,” he said, softer than usual without that hard strung of being right running through the middle, “as long as you say something.”  
It was reassuring, fraternal balancing right on the edge of paternal; close enough that Harry had to wonder if Lestrange wanted children. For the first time, he could imagine him with them, that firmness mixed with a fairness that would never be appreciated until they were adult themselves.  
Lestrange snapped him out of the thought.

“How about I make the question easier for you?” he said, his hand resting on the table in a way that drew Harry’s eye for no particular reason.  
“Tell me something you like, anything at all.”  
“Law?” Harry said, very quietly, and looking at the table because the table couldn’t judge him.  
“Which bit of it?”  
“Criminal?”  
Lestrange smiled, pressed forward enough to suggest he was no longer merely being polite.  
“You interested in a life at the bar?”  
“No,” said Harry, perhaps too quickly, but he wasn’t. Or, he didn’t _think_ he was. The bar was the place all his peers wanted to go, to take silk, though they must know barely any of them were actually worth it; they didn’t even deserve cotton. Harry wasn’t like them, he understood his worth, whilst they had coddled their whole lives into believing that they were special, he understood, he was just… average, and when you’re average, there was no point in aiming higher than what you deserved, or rather, what this society seemed to think you deserved. So, no, he wasn’t interested in being a barrister.  
“Shame,” said Lestrange, though Harry had almost forgotten he was even there, though now he was looking at him Harry couldn’t help the tension stringing itself through his shoulder and his back and his neck, because Lestrange was looking at him a little _too_ attentively.  
“Riddle thinks you’d make a good barrister,” he said slowly, and leaning in like this was something he shouldn’t be sharing.  
“Riddle thinks you’d be _good_ for a lot of…” Lestrange paused to take a sip of his wine, wetting his lips as he did so; enough that Harry felt that same pressure in the base of his stomach, as though a stone was forming as a pearl does within an oyster.  
Lestrange just smile,“…careers,” he finished, “particularly the bar, but then again, Riddle would be fantastic there too, and that’s not what he wants.”

The sound of Tom’s name fizzing over Lestrange’s tongue made Harry want to ask him questions. So many questions, like, what _did_ Tom want to do with his life? If he wasn’t persuaded with the thing, he’d be the best at.  
Harry might have said that Tom was aspiring to academia, but somehow that was little too hollow; it did not contain the bright, glittering dreams that he evoked in the people around him. And, unlike Lestrange, Harry doubted Tom had much tolerance for children, even if they were legally adults. If he was disinterested in the most _interesting_ , people Harry had ever met, then he’d never survive teaching in some dingy classroom with people with only an eighth of his own intelligence.  
Which could all only mean that Tom had different dreams, more exciting career ambitions, and he was simply dying to ask what they were. And maybe he would have asked if he hadn’t remembered how Lestrange had smiled at him; how he might just have seen what Harry thought of Tom in his deepest dreams. He didn’t want to give Lestrange an excuse to start up that conversation again.  
So instead, he said something dumb that made Lestrange smile again and take a sip of his drink. 

“You’re into criminal too, right?” Harry said swallowing the rest of his water like it would drown out every thought of Tom that was swirling around his stomach.  
“Oh, I love it,” Lestrange replied, his lips catching on the rim of his wineglass as he drank again, and the sound of his ring echoing out as it clinked against the glass.  
“Umm… d-defence or prosecution?” Harry continued with the limited court proceedings he was vaguely certain about, and rather hoping, in the back of his mind, that he’d hit a goldmine of conversational topics where Lestrange could give up the pretence of altruistic interest, and just concentrate on himself again.  
Lestrange’s smile certainly spread wide at the question, and in different circumstances, Harry might have called it voracious, but even now it definitely bordered on the farther side of eager.  
“Defence,” Lestrange said, “it’s far more satisfying than prosecution. After all, the law might state that we are all innocent until proven guilty, but that’s not the case, is it?”  
The way he said it, made Harry inclined to agree, though he wasn’t really sure why, and suddenly he was quite grateful that they were in a restaurant, surrounded noise and people. Like this, there was less weight to Lestrange’s words; they didn’t seem real or meaningful, and in the back of his head, Harry could pretend he still had faith in the legal system, even if there was a growing feeling in his every inch of his conscious self that that faith was misplaced.  
“I mean,” Lestrange continued, “the second that you are up there, you’re guilty, _everyone_ wants you to be; so, the greater skill is to subvert expectations. Make them all doubt themselves, until, suddenly, they can’t believe how they could _possibly_ have thought you were guilty in the first place.”  
“You want… power?” Harry found himself saying, the words just slipping out without him hardly noticing. It was the same thing that Tom did to him, how he dragged conversations from his mouth like they were fish, and his carefully placed words were the bait.  
“Well, I suppose you could call it such; it _is_ just as hypnotic as that conventional clout the reasonable man would call, power.”  
Harry swallowed, there was something, just _something_ in Lestrange’s tone that made the hairs on the back of his neck raise, setting him on edge like someone was scratching ice down his back. Maybe, it was just his smile, or maybe it was the brazenness with which he admitted to what he wanted; with such a clarity, an understanding, and simplicity that Harry’s own dreams could never emulate. Unless, perhaps, he could get right down to the essence of what it was that made Lestrange’s opinions quite so fascinating, so intense that they felt as though they might swallow him up.  
“Why do you want it?” Harry asked, shifting in his seat to try and dispel the uncomfortableness of talking about something he’d never really had.  
“Everyone wants to be powerful, Potter, even you.”  
“But…” he put his fork down and looked across the table to where Lestrange was sitting, haloed in light, like an angel but with the devil in his eyes, “what if… I don’t want… to be?”  
“But you do; power manifests itself in different ways; I, for instance, want to get what I want, when I want it; but Malfoy,” Lestrange paused to snicker to himself, “he just wants the power to live his life as… let’s call it, promiscuously, as he wants; and you, well _you_ want power in order to change your life, don’t you?”  
“Why would say that?” he said, as defensively as he could, without sounding offensive.  
“Because Riddle said so, the first time he met you. He said you were unsatisfied, that you were lost, that you were looking for… _something_.”  
Although he did not say it, Harry suspected the word Lestrange was going to say was not ‘something,’ but ‘someone.’ He was looking for _someone_. And maybe, he was.  
Or, maybe, he’d already found them smiling at him from the first-floor window.

“So, for you, going back to a case and all, it’s the thrill of the chase, and not the sting of the kill?” said Harry, his mouth as dry as a wood dust, and using the dramatic words he knew would catch Lestrange’s macabre eye, in a desperate attempt to get away from him so meticulously deconstructing him like he was nothing more than one of the opposing counsel’s witnesses.  
Still though, there was the same insidious thought creeping up his spine: he liked this. In a twisted, painful sort of way, being stripped back to the bones was… horrifyingly intimate.  
He wondered too what this looked like to the other patrons of this restaurant; Harry had seen them glance up casually, more out of curiosity at his presence than out of maliciousness. But still, what did they think they saw?  
Was it the methodical demolition of an argument? The casual deprivation of his case until he was sitting there as stripped as any carcass for Lestrange’s vulture-esque entertainment. Though, unlike with his official witnesses, Lestrange was making no attempt to remodel him, to change what he was saying, only to record it for later purposes.  
For the first time, Harry was grateful that Tom wasn’t here. Just from Lestrange talking about what people wanted he felt like he was burning up from the inside to the out, and the thought of standing in a court of law and having to look at Tom whilst he did _that_ , was frankly breathtaking. If Tom had been here now, he would have stolen away the oxygen from his lungs and watched as Harry suffocated on the red-soaked air, and it might just have been beautiful.  
But whatever it was he felt inside, Harry hoped, for the sake of the jury, Tom never did become a barrister. Or, maybe he should, for Harry couldn’t quite imagine anyone _ever_ denying Tom the things he wanted, and if what he wanted was a conviction, then he was going to get it.

Harry shook his head, suddenly realising he was staring again; looking at nothing in particular for a little too long until there were sharp lines, and even sharper edges covering every inch.  
“That’s a skilful misdirection, Potter, turning everything back to me; but I’ll assume it’s flattery for your sake. To answer your question though, yeah, you could say it like that, although, you sound like you disagree?” said Lestrange, apparently happy to be led away from these explorations, as though he was an oceanographer than had already surveyed those previous waters to satisfaction.  
“It – just – you know…”  
“You’re going to have to say in plain fucking English if you want an answer.”  
Harry swallowed; he could do this, Lestrange he didn’t care what he said as long as it was something. He could argue, he could make cases; if he did it to Tom, he could do it to anyone, right?  
“The chase, seems superfluous; after all, no one likes the fat on pork roasts, do they? So why would a jury like it on their case? They hold so much power in their hands at that moment that they don’t – they don’t – need any more aggrandisement,” Harry swallow, “they get to play God with people’s lives, surely that’s the simple fact you play too, yeah?”  
As he spoke, Lestrange’s head tilted to the side and his mouth spread again into one of those sleek smiles that simply meant he’d thought of something. Though when Harry finished, all in a breathless rush, Lestrange stayed silent, as though he was sampling the silence between them. Seeing how uncomfortable he could make it.  
“I like that,” he said eventually, “but I didn’t know you had the brutality in you, Potter; to condemn a man to death because you want to feel like God. But then again, Riddle said weren’t as much of a pushover as you looked, that’s why he likes you; because you’re… multidimensional. Almost nebulous, if you know what I mean.”  
Harry did not know what he meant, but it didn’t matter when he could feel his heart beating quite so intently on the length of his tongue, pressing right down into the centre as through the slow swirls an eddy was forming on the floor of his mouth, threatening to pull everything inside itself, until he was choking on his own tongue. He reached for his water, and tried, unsuccessfully to stifle a coughing gasping stutter that resulted in a fair amount of water failing to reach his mouth.  
If Lestrange acknowledged him spluttering, he had the courtesy not to mention it. He just looked over his own glass with a decorum that Harry was so far away from it was embarrassing.  
“Now tell me,” Lestrange said, firmly ignore that Harry was still choking, “have you ever considered – ?”

He didn’t get to finish, for they were interrupted by Malfoy sauntering back over to the table and grinning like a child who’d got some candy. He looked immaculate; shirt all proper and his hair done right, and nothing at all how he’d been around Tom. But maybe that was because it was private, when this, well… it wasn’t.  
“Twenty-three minutes, thirty seconds,” he said, slapping his hand down on the table, “I do believe you’re picking up the bill.”  
“Urgh,” Lestrange groaned, “you know, every day you stray further from probity,” he said in the most bored tone Harry heard him use yet, as though he recognised exactly where Malfoy was headed _and_ had the power to stop him, but simply chose not to.  
“Well, I can tell you that it was _definitely_ worth it.”  
Lestrange raised both eyebrows, “really? Worth even enough to ignore what Riddle said about outsiders?”  
Malfoy rolled his eyes and sighed. “It’s not like I plan on seeing her again, and anyway, what Riddle doesn’t know, won’t hurt him, will it?”  
There was the slightest of threats stitched through his words, and Harry suspected that, although he addressed Lestrange, that little tiny threat was supposed to apply equally to him. That he should consider himself, bound, and as good as dead if he were to step over that mark.  
“You tell me, you’re closer to him,” said Lestrange, still spread across as much as the seat as he physically could be without lying down.  
“So?” said Malfoy, “you’ve always been his confidant, so, if anyone’s going to tell him, Lestrange, it’d be you.”  
That was probably a fact. From what Harry had seen, he suspected Lestrange wasn’t as concerned for morals as he apparently made out, at least, not when it came to, getting the results he wanted. No matter how many people might have to fall in order for those desires to be realised.  
Lestrange laughed though, for a good twenty seconds, before his face very suddenly went still and inclined his head to look Malfoy in the eye.  
“Riddle doesn’t need me to tell him things that are fucking obvious.”  
“And how, pray tell, is it obvious?” said Malfoy, leaning down, both hands now on the table.  
“Would you like a bibliography?”  
Malfoy didn’t smile  
So Lestrange continued with that look that suggested he knew _exactly_ what he was doing.  
“One, I can smell her perfume from here; two, there’s lipstick on your collar; three it’s just fucking obvious. We’ve all seen your infidelity enough to know what it looks like on your skin.”  
The bite behind the words was now undeniable, so much so, that the question ‘how many times had this happened?’ started to skim across the surface of Harry’s brain, before digging right down between the folds.  
“That wasn’t a particularly great list,” said Malfoy sourly, rubbing at the corner of his collar with his fingers, as though that would make the dark red stain disappear. It didn’t, it sort of spread it right into the fibres, like the tomato stain on the tablecloth that Harry was currently hiding under his plate. 

They stared off a little longer. Lestrange clearly enjoying his short time above Malfoy on the food chain. “Would you, at least, let me sit down?” Malfoy said impatiently.  
“Fine,” Lestrange groaned again, as if this was all _way_ too much effort, before shifting himself across the leather and back to his original position, as though they were resetting this entire afternoon back to stage one.  
Malfoy slid in once again beside and picked up his fork, but before he took a bite, he actually looked at his food.  
“Wait? Did you eat my lunch?” he said, motioning to the glaringly obvious forkfuls taken from the righthand side. There was no way Lestrange could have actively denied it.  
“Well you did leave it without supervision,” he said casually, examining his nails because it looked pretentious and was just melodramatic enough to be annoying.  
“You are _unbelievable_ , do you know that?” said Malfoy.  
“Yeah, well you fucked a waitress.”  
It was blunt to say the least, and Harry found himself just staring at the wood of the floor, following its grain patterns with his eyes and hoping the tension would start to melt away soon. At least enough that he could look up, and maybe start examining the leather on the chairs instead.  
“Touché,” said Malfoy, apparently unwilling to argue the point, though he hadn’t the grounds nor the means to have refuted it. Instead, he started to delicately pick at his half-eaten and, by now, lukewarm, if not entirely cold, soufflé. He still ate it though.  
“So, what are we talking about?” he said, three bites in.  
“Well now Potter and I have got the niceties out the way, I was thinking of the German elections,” said Lestrange with a smile, “they are fucking intriguing, to say the least.”

**Author's Note:**

> This is also way more ambitious than what I'd usually attempt, but you have to challenge yourself occasionally, don't you? Anyway, I hope this wasn't too terrible.


End file.
